


Tales of the Third Great War

by Kimmuendo



Category: The Banner Saga (Video Games)
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Norse Religion & Lore, F/M, Friendship/Love, Loss, M/M, Male Homosexuality, POV Multiple, Sad journey, Sorrow, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-15
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-09-24 14:00:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 17
Words: 35,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9748205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kimmuendo/pseuds/Kimmuendo
Summary: Hundreds of years ago, war tore apart the land in every sense of the word. Much of what is known of that time is collected from scraps, fleeting hints of truth. That is, until you happen upon an unassuming crypt, housing a tome full of stories of people who walked with Skogr's Banner. Much within this book will challenge what you and your order have always known.





	1. GODGA, part 1

**Author's Note:**

> *NEW* PLEASE NOTE: It is not necessary to read these chapters in order. Each new title refers to new characters or plot arcs that you can enjoy. If one isn't doing it for you, check out the others. You may be surprised at who shows up!
> 
> In honour of Stoic's astounding Kickstarter success for Banner Saga 3, I bring you stories of our favourite characters (and some we've only met in passing). These are all speculative tales of things I imagine may or may not have happened along the way. Thank you, Stoic and co., for creating such a well-rounded, breathtaking piece of art! And you, dear reader, for happening upon my trap! What? No, I didn't say trap, I said story! Yes. Go read now. Just go.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A book is found that contains information previously unknown. Will this historic account be of value?

_As you move aside another enormous funeral slab, you find a weathered tome, protected from the elements but clearly succumbing to its age. It rests inside the remains of a huge cage of bones, remnants of a race long since lived. With careful hands you extract the book. It is heavy, bound in leather, with hundreds of pages. Inside the cover is a brief inscription. Though it is written in ancient text, you find it familiar and easy to read, thanks to your extensive studies. You sit by the tomb and look it over in wisplight._

* * *

Those of us who have survived the Third Great War know of its tale. Many races produced from within their ranks great heroes that inspired the grandest stories that keep us fighting to eek out an existence on the land that remains. Those of you who read this now likely tell your children the legends spread from the shreds of the Long Banner in Arberrang, the history that wove itself as it occurred. Some, too, may have heard of the epics spread by the great skald Aleo, weaver of legends. Though Aleo’s Edda and the mender banner offer insight to the events that led to the halting of the end, the rebirth of the gods, and the salvation of our land, there exists a crevasse between them in which the stories of its people have been lost.

As a scrivener who has lived centuries beyond his calling, I have come to see the value in recounting those people. Having spent some time with the Sundr-Slayer and the caravan that followed, I can provide this insight. This, a scope into the lives of everyday humans and varl, the glorious and the grim, is the unadulterated truth. Take from these stories within a greater understanding of who your forefathers were as heroes; embrace their faults, their greatness, their woes and joys, and find within yourself a wisdom to better the world in which you exist.

* * *

_Following this introduction is a map of Old Midgardr, the world which existed over a century ago. You spend some time studying unfamiliar provinces, mountain ranges, settlements, and islands before continuing to the first account._

* * *

Even before Juno finished climbing the stairs, she could feel him. The energy he emanated was so full of trepidation it was any wonder the walls themselves didn't tremble. The feelings of being found out, accused, or in great trouble seized her again, and she realized the fears she had felt that morning were not her own.

She had thought to seek out the keeper and ask her in which room the mender was waiting, but the closer Juno got, the harder it was to even pretend she could not feel where he was. She approached the door, weaved the appropriate pattern to open it, and slowly stepped inside.

He was standing in the middle of the room, taut like he was ready to run—a caged animal, frightened for his life. Tall for his age yet still shorter than her, reedy, wayward hair and wilder hazel eyes, caught somewhere between boyhood and manhood, he was the embodiment of maladroitness. He even clenched and unclenched his fists like he was uncertain he was doing it properly.

To disarm the tension, she left the door open and slowly moved to the corner of the room. The way out was unbarred. He looked between her and the door and took a step back.

“Do you know who I am?” she asked softly.

He hesitated. “Valka Juno? You sit on the Council.”

“Yes.” Though she already knew the answer, she asked: “What is your name?”

“Eyvind.” He was darting his eyes about as if to spot some unseen malice.

“Eyvind. I believe I've seen you before. You have been studying with the builders for some time, haven't you?”

He nodded. “My parents taught with the builders.”

_Taught_. “I take it they no longer do.”

His nervous energy was receding, but in its place there was a sudden sadness. Loss. “No, they don't.”

“I'm sorry.”

He had visibly released his shoulders but his eyes were still flighty. “What has the Council decided to do with me?” he asked. His voice broke as he spoke, either from maturation or emotion, she could not tell.

“To protect you.”

He blinked and stood straighter. “Oh.”

She smiled warmly. “Did you think we would clasp you in chains and parade you about the square?”

He did not recognize the humour. “No, I thought...I can stay in Manaharr?”

She made her smile fade. “Only you can make the decision to leave.”

Eyvind rubbed one of his palms on his pant leg. “The Arbernese...I don't think they'll see this as fair.”

“Why?”

He visibly struggled to find the right words. “What I did.”

She motioned to the study stone on the other side of the room. “May we sit, Eyvind?”

He looked at the stone like he had never seen it before, then picked at his fingertips as he approached the table and sat stiffly. She sat across from him, resting her spear in the crook of her arm. “Can you tell me what happened?” She already had the details from the Council but wanted to see the boy's perspective and show him that someone really was on his side by hearing him out.

He swallowed, staring at his hands. “There was a storm blowing in and there were some fishermen on the water. It came so quickly that they didn't have time to get back to the docks before they were caught in it. I...didn't really know what I was doing, but there was something about the storm that I could just... _feel_.” He stopped to swallow. “So I tried reaching for it, thinking I was breaking up the clouds.” He began picking under one of his fingernails.

She looked at him with pity. A child with the power like the gods.

“I know how you must feel,” she said gently. “Once, when I was about your age, I was working in the hospice in Arberrang. I wanted to become an accomplished healer, you see, so I went to where healing was most needed. There was a man there who had been sick for days, and none of the senior menders could seem to abate his symptoms. The disease was getting worse and worse, and it spread quickly through his body. He was in so much pain. All I wanted to do was take it away from him. And, like you did, I felt something waiting there for me, like I'd known the threads all along—I had only to reach out and pull them.

“So I did. He opened his eyes almost right away. It was as if he had not just been in a fever dream the minute before. He started to tell me of his family—his son wanted to be a knight and his daughter wanted to be a shieldmaiden. Both still loved to ride on his shoulders. His gratitude was overwhelming, and he cried when he thanked me for saving his life so that he might see his children grow to be those things. I went to fetch my superior to show her what had been done. When I brought her back, the man had passed away.”

Eyvind had been leaning forward in his seat. His eyes were wide and his mouth hung open slightly. She smiled sadly. “It haunted me for years afterward. I had believed I was responsible for ending that man's life. In the beginning I was sure I would be dismissed as well. What sort of guild would keep on a student who had performed with such gross misconduct?

“The instructors tried to abate my guilt, but it was always there, just under the surface, preventing me from moving forward. It wasn't until Valka Zefr came to me that I began to come back from it. She taught me to ruminate was to prevent my own healing, and a healer can't very well repair others if her mind needs it first.”

Eyvind frowned. “What does ruminate mean?”

“To think on something endlessly, but not make it better. It is difficult to let go of guilt, for it convinces you it is something you deserve to carry as penance, but it is not until you have set it free that you can truly begin to correct your wrongs.” She leaned forward to try and look into his eyes. “Do you understand?”

For the first time since she had entered the room, Eyvind held her gaze long enough to properly enter his mind. His thoughts were erratic, flying in every which direction like scattering ravens, as if he felt ashamed to even be thinking them, and too frightened to hold onto them for long. She caught on one of his fleeting thoughts—calm, comfort, self-forgiveness—and nurtured it, helping it take root and grow. It was flowering when he nodded.

“Menders heal and build; Valka can create and undo order and chaos,” she said. “You have that capacity. What you did on the docks of Arberrang has not been seen since my grandmother's time, when she and other Valka drove the dredge from these lands into the North.”

Most young boys Juno knew of delighted in hearing they excelled others in strength and skill, but Eyvind looked like he'd just been told that if he so much as looked at someone, that person would be killed.

“I know it's a lot to take in,” she said, lowering her voice until it was almost a whisper. “It will be hard to deal with, and sometimes it will feel like you have to do it all on your own. There are some things that others simply cannot help you with, like dealing with grief. The biggest challenge you will likely face is knowing when and how to seek out others' help. Whenever you're ready to do that, Eyvind...I'll be there for you.”

His head was hung so that she could not see his eyes anymore. He nodded quickly.

“Would you like some time alone?” she asked.

Again, a quick, curt nod.

“I'll have bread and milk brought from the kitchen. Stay here as long as you need to. When you're ready, let the keeper know, and I will have her bring you to me.” She stood and looked down upon him. “Remember what I said about ruminating.”

A nod.

She closed the door quietly behind her.

When she walked back into the Council Chamber, the others had nearly finished drafting their compensation and were preparing to meet the Crown with their offer to the offended party. Fjorinn was the first to pause and look her way. The others followed. Only this morning, those same eyes gave her such consternation as to halt her in her tracks; now she strode forward with confidence, and said, deep and clear:

“I have done as tasked, and would ask to take Eyvind on as my apprentice.”

* * *

“Don't worry about pulling the threads just yet. I want you to think on the shape of them. What do you see?”

They stood in the stone gardens neighbouring the rope bridge that led up to the tower. Very few others were outside with them, for even though it was spring, the air was so full of cold as to seep through cloak and skin. It was starting to get to Eyvind as well, but she saw that neither of them wanted to end the lesson just yet.

“It's hard to describe,” he said.

“Does it resemble something familiar to you?”

He thought on it at great length. “It's almost...it reminds me of fusing metal links together.”

“And why is that?”

“There's something about the way they begin. They...move the same?”

“Putting it into words isn't as important. If you can see the picture, all you need do is carve it.” She handed him the whittle. He took it from her gingerly as a dog might take a treat from his owner's hand. Curious, she took a careful look at his thoughts. The embarrassment wracked him so utterly that he would have rather faced the Council than accidentally touch her hand.

She smiled, both because of his harmless nature and to dispel his troubles, though she felt she did the opposite when he turned from her and sat at the stone bench. He held his staff between his knees, looked up at the sky, then began to trace a line on one side.

Juno took a seat next to him, ensuring to give him enough space, and allowed him time to work in silence.

Several minutes later, he said, “I wanted to ask you a question, Valka Juno.”

She waited. When he did not continue, she smiled. “You know you don't need to ask permission to ask me questions, Eyvind. That's what I'm here for.”

He nodded, wincing as if he had made a foolish mistake. “I wanted to know what you did for your world experience to be a Valka.”

“Already?”

“I just thought I'd start earlier rather than later.” He blew on the line he'd been tracing to clear it of shavings.

“Well, you know I was Valka Zefr's apprentice for many years.”

“Yes.”

“And do you know what her specialty is?”

He leaned forward as he started to cut a very fine curve onto the side of his staff. “The dredge.”

“Yes. As you can imagine, there are very few resources on dredge language, stonesinging, culture, way of life. All that we have was gathered by her when she started her field research. She spent much of her time exploring underground caverns, gathering what evidence she could find.”

Eyvind stopped to look at her. “Were there...”

“Dredge? Some. She said they would always be watching in the distance, never getting too close. They aren't as dangerous as the stories would have you believe. We may be far more dangerous, in fact.

“Naturally, being her apprentice, I was expected to carry on her work. I had a bit of a rebellious spirit in me at that age, however, and decided I would seek out the late gods instead.”

Eyvind grinned mischievously. “You were rebellious?”

“In my own way.” She grinned back. “We already knew much of the gods' language, but little was uncovered as to how they lived their day to day lives, or to what they owed their powers of immortality. I sought to uncover these secrets.

“Most godstones are found on high ground so that travellers can easily navigate the land, but little do many know that there are dredge tunnels that open up nearby almost all of them. I used those paths to cut across mountain ranges and lakes to visit one god and the next. It was during these hikes that I discovered things that Zefr had not touched upon in her writing, particularly more information regarding the Sundr.”

Eyvind had stopped etching into his staff. “You saw a Sundr?”

“No, I did not. But I found stones dedicated to them. Using Zefr's research, I read what was engraved. In their own way, they are the last gods alive. Dredge do not have natural deaths. With the weaving that they can command, they are like the best of the humans and the varl put together. They are an exemplary species, but In many ways, they really are not so different from us.”

“What did you learn about their abilities?” he asked, awestruck.

It was an answer she could not risk giving him. Not truthfully, at least. Her position on the council—and her safety—would be compromised. Instead she reached out and sought to distance him from his question, considering that answer enough. She found herself in the middle of one of his thoughts, small and buried as it was: about how pleasing he found her company, and...

She snapped back and stood abruptly. The effect on him was just as sudden: he tensed like he was expecting a blow to land, and his face had gone beet red. Was he aware that she saw? He must have suspected something, given her reaction, but he seemed preoccupied with his own embarrassment.

“Forgive me, I thought I felt something crawling on me,” she said.

“Oh.” He bent over to pick up his staff and held it, white-knuckled. “I'm sorry, Valka Juno, I suddenly don't feel well. Might I be excused?”

“Of course. Take the rest of the day. We'll meet here again in the morning.” She spoke quickly, and without looking at him. She hadn't finished speaking when he stood and walked back to the tower. To ensure she did not run into him again, she sat on the bench and allowed space to build.

She had studied the world's greatest mysteries across Midgardr, faced the horrors of solitude in the dredge underground, learned of the gods' ways, and now led leaders in matters of wisdom, but when it came to dealing with adolescent boys with infatuations for their teachers, she was as as much a novice as the newest menders. The rest of the afternoon was spent like she was drawing up battle plans for a varl warlord.

The next day when they met in the courtyard, Juno brought with her an iron countenance and steel resolve. Eyvind waited for her, eyes downcast, shoulders hunched. Where normally she would give him a reassuring smile, she remained stoic, and did not dare try to ease his insecurity for fear of intruding on thoughts that ought to be kept private. “Are you ready for the day's lesson?”

She watched him grow more distant, only by a modicum, but enough that she felt she had wounded herself doing it. “Yes, Valka Juno.”

This time, when they sat on the bench to carve the patterns into the staff, it was without trading any words.

_It must be this way_ , she told herself.

 

 

 

 


	2. GODGA, part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some relationships will never change, while others yearn to.

Juno arrived before any of the others to sit alone in the Council Chambers. Sometimes, when she came here just before dawn, songs would reach her. Not of birds, and not of voices, but from the dreams of those still asleep in the tower, the dreams that did not root themselves in memory upon waking. It was a chorus of colours and feelings that transcended any spoken language. No matter the content, the chorus was always sublime, spiraling up to the high ceiling. If she closed her eyes she felt like she could rise up with the resonance and be part of the beauty too.  
  
The doors opened, giving Juno a rise. This rarely ever occurred, for Juno could always hear a person's steps and their thoughts long before they approached. Engrossed as she was in the song she could not sing, Zefr caught her off guard, standing in the doorway. Between the corridor outside, lit with a torch and sun mirrors, and the utterly dark chamber, she was a stark silhouette, a sharp contrast between that world and this. Even if Juno could not read thoughts like they were books, she could recognize Zefr's shadow anywhere.  
  
“Juno,” she said, “I did not expect anyone to be here this early.”

“Nor I, Valka Zefr.” As she spoke, she moved to stand, but caught herself and remained seated. She gripped her staff hard enough to make her knuckles white.  
  
Zefr headed for her seat, each footfall clacking sharply and echoing up the tower. The song had since fled. “Are you not sleeping well?” she asked.  
  
“On the contrary, I slept soundly enough that I awoke well-rested this morning.”  
  
“If you can yet call it morning.”  
  
“The world is darkest before the dawn, and that is when I quit the bed. By now the light is reaching the others' windows. So, yes, I can call it morning.”  
  
Zefr sat in her seat, which was far enough away that they sat on opposite ends of the Council table, seated across from one another. Only part of her face was illuminated from the hall outside. “As cantankerous as you were at Eyvind's age,” she said conversationally.  
  
“I would use the word rational.” As if it would help to sever the conversation and escape, Juno closed her eyes, hoping to rediscover the song.  
  
“The guard came for Eyvind, Juno,” Zefr said after some time.  
  
Juno opened her eyes again. “When?”  
  
“Last night.”  
  
She became rigid enough that she nearly rose from her seat. “Did they take him?”  
  
“No.” Juno sank back into her chair like an invisible hand had had her in its vise-grip and subsequently lost interest in holding her any longer, what with the danger gone. “They came to inform us that a family had been taken under arrest for conspiring to harm a member of the mender's college. Specifically, your student.”  
  
“The family of the fisherman?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Does Eyvind know?”  
  
“No, not yet. This is an item tabled for discussion today, on how to best proceed.”  
  
Eyvind was safe, and so she was left not feeling gratitude, but a sort of cold one experiences after leaving a hot spring to stumble through a snowbank. She said nothing more, and Zefr did not press further conversation.  
  
There was no one else that made Juno behave this way—disparaging, unreasonable, malcontent. With others she would always take on the role of nurturer, free of pride, judgement, or prejudice. For a while Juno blamed herself; she ought to be the better, resolve to present herself as her predecessors had and give Zefr the same kindness that was owed to everyone. It wasn't until halfway through her apprenticeship that she realized she was acting upon the thoughts that Zefr emanated. So strong was her aversion to Juno that Juno had no other choice but to behave in kind.  
  
A look into Zefr's thoughts proved difficult, for she could no longer separate her own projection from Zefr's antipathy. Rarely could she work her own abilities when she was as spurred as this.  
“Excuse me.” Juno stood and strode from the chamber.  
  
Had the gods still lived, they would have known that Juno tried. While Zefr's apprentice, she played the pliant part of green girl, then tried becoming an eager sycophant (much to her own chagrin). When both those roles failed, she tried currying favour by being who she has—wise, capable, talented, independent. Of course, no matter what disposition she assumed, Zefr was always mildly disappointed, judgemental, as if she could see right through everything Juno did as just an act for other people, even when she was herself. There was no winning over Zefr because Zefr had grown into a person who believed she was the ultimate, the one true scholar with whom no one could truly best, because she was the very pinnacle of humanity.  
  
_No_ , Juno tried to remind herself,  _that's how I perceive her_.  
  
There was no coming back from such an opinion.  
  
She paced the grounds outside the front doors for an hour more until the Council was due to assemble. When she walked back in, she was the last to arrive, and she was certain there was a subtle sense of petty triumph from someone in the room because of it.

* * *

“You're decided, then.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
His voice. It had gotten so much  _deeper_.  
  
Juno looked at him; he averted is eyes only for a moment, then stared back. There was only so much watching she could do without reaching into his mind, so she busied herself with a leather note to prevent it. “I will prepare you as best I can. However, I do want to draw to your attention the many more options you could explore.”  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“To list a few: Working in the king's court, contacting the horseborn, discussing history and culture with the varl in Grofheim...”  
  
He started with an apology, but stopped himself before he could get a syllable out. Though she had promised herself not to make it a habit, she slipped back in his mind again, and saw the man budding there. Instead of a timorous response, he gave her a grin. “I want to continue  _your_  work.”  
  
Juno made to sit at her study stone. Eyvind sat across from her. “You're only sixteen,” she said, as if that alone was the greatest argument she had for changing his mind.  
  
He spent some time just sitting there, brow knit tight. “It's not...my age that defines me. It's my skill, my education. And...” He swallowed. “The work you did. There's only so much in the libraries. I want to be able to come back and fill it with more. We've only ever seen the dredge as a blight but they are a whole race that we have neglected to befriend. The best of the varl and humans, you said. You wanted to know. So do I.” He looked up, eyes hard enough to break stone.  
  
“I will have to pass this by the Council,” she lied.  
  
He gave the slightest of shrugs. So sure of himself. Eyvind had grown nearly a foot in the last year, but she still had to look down. For how long? If he left, he'd be gone a year at the least. At the most...when he came back, it would be she looking up. The thought struck a note in her chest that only resonated louder by the second.  
  
He was staring straight into her, and for a moment she felt it was he searching her mind. “I will come back,” he said.  
  
The words were spoken with ease, yet they were laden with a weight she couldn't quite bear to carry yet. So instead she unfurled the leather before her and said, “Let's prepare your trip.” She bent the threads with her hands and injected purpose into them. As the words began to write themselves, student and teacher sat in silence, years of unsaid words building bridges between them.


	3. GODGA, part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A sudden loss brings others together.

She was sitting by Valka Fjorinn on the docks of Arberrang, watching the sun set into the endless horizon of the Vast. “Most of my life has been spent in these parts,” Fjorinn told her gently, “yet I've hardly ever seen the sunsets here.”  
  
“Never in the tower?” Juno asked.  
  
“I could see evening light from my window all year round, but the alignment wasn't quite right to see the sun itself. I never really thought about going out of my way to watch it go down, to be honest. There was always work to be done. It would have been a distraction.” He sighed, a great, heavy sound, like he had been walking endlessly for years and had just finally sat down at home. “I wonder, what else might I have missed out on?”  
  
She reached out and cradled his mind, slowly lifting away the black thoughts. “It does not do to try and collect all the things that were not, but reach out for those that can be.”  
  
He chuckled. “I was reluctant to give you a seat on the Council at first. You were hardly a woman yet, and I did not want to extend the offer when whispers of unwarranted legacy were abound. Your grandmother was great, but who were you? The Council showed me your nomination had very little to do with her name. They thought you capable, and Zefr above all knew you to be beyond ready. I am glad I listened to them. Sometimes, the things you know makes me wonder if you're really as young as we think you are. Beyond your wisdom, Juno...you've been an incredible friend to me these last few years. That is something I will always hold dear.”  
  
As she turned to look at him, she frowned. Then she looked at her hands, her nightgown, the docks around them. The sun had just barely sank below the Vast but the world had grown dark as if it had been gone for hours. Had they been sitting there for hours?  
  
He covered her hand with his. “Thank you.” He stood, walked out along the dock, and she lost sight of him amidst the darkness.  
  
When she woke, it was in her own bed in Manaharr, with barely a portion of moonlight to see by.  
  
She sat bolt upright, weaved flame on the candle by her bed...then stopped. She listened. She searched with her mind. She remained like that for too long.  
  
It was with a shaking hand that she snuffed the candle and laid back down. Sleep did not come for the rest of the night. Come dawn, she rose and watched the sun rise.  
  
Hours later, the keeper cried out for the other Valka from his chambers.

* * *

The funeral was short, yet the resonant tones of the rites shook all those in attendance to their bones, and the vibrations were felt long after Fjorinn was sepulchered and left behind in the crypts with all the other Valka who had served the council.  
  
Dusi sat wearily in Fjorinn's old seat. When the other members had settled, he said, “It is with melancholy that I begin this meeting and declare the first item of business that of a new Council member. I request a draft of appropriate candidates and defence for their competency from each of you. They will be compiled and reviewed by the next meeting. Are there any comments to be made on the matter?” When no one put forth any motions, he weaved the item off his list.  
  
“The next order: Answur will need to continue his apprenticeship under a new mentor.” The apprentice in question stood at the back wall with the other apprentices. Hrani put his hand on Answur's shoulder, and Answur's lips tightened into a line, eyes burning straight ahead.  
  
Dusi continued, “Aki, Zefr, Uldhriel—I want you three to observe him in his work and decide amongst yourselves which of the three of you would be better suited to mentor him, if he does prove eligible. This is his schedule here.” Dusi handed over a rolled piece of cloth to Aki, closest to him. “Any questions on the matter?”  
  
Juno openly browsed some of their thoughts. Uldhriel was getting lost in his own pain, still listening to the hymn from hours before. Aki was impressed at how concise Dusi was leading the meeting so far. Zefr was considering a motion to double the number of apprentices taken in now that their numbers were running thin.  
  
Only six Valka remained, and so far there were only three apprentices in training. Most on the Council were old—some were not even Valka, but experienced menders. It would not be surprising to see one of them pass away every year at this rate. It made her think of her father, and her grandmother, and wonder where their thread would finally be cut. She doubted she would ever have her own children. The closest she had to that was Eyvind, and even then it wasn't accurate to describe him that way.  
She realized Zefr was staring at her brazenly, that look of mild disapproval alive as ever. Then she noticed the other Council members were watching her expectantly.  
  
“Excuse me, I misheard,” Juno said to Dusi.  
  
“Have you received word on Eyvind's progress?” he repeated, the words enunciated, sharp.  
  
A heavy weight descended on her chest. “Not for some time.”

* * *

The tower had been asleep for hours, but Juno had hardly been able to keep her eyes closed for more than a few minutes at a time. Each time she did she saw her grandmother's eyes, or a body in the shape of Fjorinn, or Eyvind waiting for her at the bridge to Manaharr.  
  
The latter of these thoughts calmed her the most, so when she was desperate enough for sleep, she set aside her troubles and imagined Eyvind returning home. The last time he had sent a letter, he had been approaching the Dainn Stones, and intended on following the Wyrmscale north after a time. That had been months ago.  
  
Where would he be now? His ultimate destination was Valkajokull, or at least as far as he could reasonably bivouac in the Silent Steppes. Naturally, he would have to pass through Skyhorn, that fortress that was built like the gods had raised it. Some days, when the air was cold and wet, the tower disappeared into the clouds. The varl there would tolerate his presence, give him food and a bed for a time, and help him on his way into dredge territory.  
  
A lifetime ago she had been there. She pictured herself walking along the battlements, counting the crenels as she passed the parapet into the tower. There were some rooms there too tight to be habitable by a varl but spacious for a human. Once, she had slept in those rooms. She walked through the closed door and pictured Eyvind sitting by the hearth.  
  
Besides looking like he hadn't bathed in quite some time, it seemed he had aged ten years in one. Nearly skin and bones, bearded, uncut, and a sharper jaw than he would have had before he left. She was noting all the other details about his face that she had dreamed up, finding the clarity remarkable. It didn't quite sink in until he was looking at her.  
  
Panic came crashing in. Eyvind's eyes widened.  
  
She was hanging above her own head at Skyhorn and at Manaharr, looking down at herself. Like sliding a dislocated joint back into place, she caught her balance, straddling both. Her perception of time was grounded now, compared to her exchange with Fjorinn. Now revolved around Eyvind.  
  
He did not say anything for some time. When she looked into his mind she watched him flip flop between believing she was physically there and ardent decisiveness that this was an abnormally lucid dream. She brought him down to the point where whether or not this was real or fabricated was no longer relevant to him—this simply was.  
  
When he settled there, he sunk back into his chair. “I just sent you a report,” Eyvind said by way of greeting. His voice was hoarse.  
  
“Are you ill?” she asked.  
  
“No.” He looked at her questioningly. Every mender knew how to thwart most maladies, and rarely succumbed to sickness. That just meant that he had grown that much more in their time apart.  
  
“You've come a long way,” she remarked.  
  
“So have you.”  
  
“In a sense.” The wall she had spent years building between them did not exist here, and she allowed herself to smile for him again.  
  
“Do you want to know what was in the report?”  
  
“Of course. Go ahead.”  
  
“I found markings on the Dainn stones, most of them similar. I couldn't read them, but I knew you could. I took sketches and sent them to you.”  
  
This took her by surprise. The Dainn Stones had been studied for centuries, and no one found any clues as to their purpose or origin. “Where did you find these markings?”  
  
“On the tops.”  
  
“You...climbed the Dainn stones.”  
  
“I did.”  
  
She laughed. It made him smile. Wiser women had been there before and had considered digging down. It took her apprentice going there for someone to finally consider looking up.  
  
When the laughter receded, so did her smile. “Eyvind, I'm here because Valka Fjorinn has passed away.”  
  
He blanched. “When?”  
  
“Just last night.”  
  
His head became too heavy to hold up. “I've known him since I was a child.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“He was...”  
  
“I know.” She moved closer and tried to put a hand on his shoulder, like putting a finger over a star in the sky as if to touch it. Though their distance was far, she felt his somber thoughts as if they were her own. To reach out and cradle them was easier than breathing. Rather than take away his pain, she gave him a light in which to cast upon it. It grew brighter with each passing second.  
  
“I've missed this,” he said.  
  
“What?”  
  
“Feeling this way.”  
  
“What do you feel like?”  
  
“Cared for.” He was looking at his feet.  
  
Even though they weren't really touching, she moved her hand away. “You'll be heading north tomorrow?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Then I imagine you won't see me again for some time.”  
  
He looked up at her, pointedly holding her gaze, and stood. “Yes I will.”  
  
They were of a height now.  
  
She opened her eyes to dawn, the air heavy and still as if it was a late winter day, and there was not a sound in the world to distract her from what she had thought.


	4. GODGA, part 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The truth.

 

She did see him again, several weeks later, and several more times after that. He would send her a letter— _Grofheim, Second Moon_ —and she would fall asleep to find him waiting for her, like he was the one who could enter dreams instead of her. They discussed his findings, how best to add them to the library in the tower, and what they might mean based on current knowledge.

Had she been anyone else, she would have to wait for her apprentice to return home in order to discuss what had been discovered. This way, Eyvind gleaned more from what he presented to her and learned what else to look for, while Juno could tailor his experience abroad so that he knew where to go next and what to look for.

To say this of the utmost importance to her in their meetings would not be strictly truthful.

“Eyvind?” She turned in a circle. Normally he was right there in front of her whenever she sought out his location. Perhaps he wasn't asleep yet, but she doubted that. She also had every confidence this was the right place (the note he had sent her last was now worn thin and dog-eared from her worrying at it so much).

“Juno.”

She found him behind her. A weariness was carved around his eyes by something other than fatigue. Neither said a word while Eyvind struggled to maintain eye contact with her.

“Something has happened to you,” she said eventually, to get him to speak.

He did not meet her eyes. “You can enter minds.”

The way he said it.

Many rebuttals and excuses that came to mind. It would diminish her to say any of them, even if they were true. Not saying anything was just as damning. “What brought this on, Eyvind?”

He raised his eyebrows and held his breath. “I found a stone dedicated to the Sundr. What they could do.”

It had been some time since she last saw it, but she knew the stone he had seen, what it contained, why he was dispirited. She pretended not to know the connection, and waited for him to fill in the hole with the truth.

“Bellower, on the stone. It had runes on it. 'Mind control'. It's how he organized dredge armies. 'We're not so different,' you said. Humans could be more dangerous. And the dreams...” Eyvind looked her in the eye. “Altering minds is a crime in the Council's eyes. I knew that. You being in my dreams...I wasn't surprised. That's when I knew.”

The blow sank in, slow and deep. “You knew I could, long before these meetings.”

“You control others?” His eyes met hers briefly.

“Only heal them.”

“Heal them of what?”

“That which weakens them.”

“Is that what you do to me?”

She did not answer promptly and he did not press her. Finally she said, “I take away your obstacles. Your decisions, your actions—that is you, unbarred.” She hesitated, undecided on her next admission. Then came the guilt. Of course she should be decided. “I would never change you, even if I could.”

When she looked up at him again, he was no longer avoiding her face. “I want to tell you, but I think you already know,” he said.

Still, she did not look into his mind; she had learned her lesson. He deserved more than that. However...“I do.”

He winced at his feet. Colour lit up his face. “I'm at a disadvantage.”

“How?”

“I can't look into your mind.”

“You don't need to look into my mind to know what I think.”

“I don't know what you think, or how you feel.”

A yearning pain filled her chest.

“You are my only family,” she could have said. It was the truth, after all. The heart held a capacity to truly care for only a small few people, but even knowing only a handful of souls, she really only held Eyvind in great esteem. If she faced a particularly difficult day, she would seek him out. All the great days, he was there. Every day that passed without him was long, like trudging through mud in furs.

“You are my student,” she should have said. It would not sever the ties that were already bound—there was no way she could do that besides banishing him from the tower, and she would have sooner handed herself over to the Council—but it would serve to maintain the safe distance between them, at least for a short time longer. After all, it was a truth she only ever thought about but needed to say aloud to convince herself of it.

The things she needed to say and wanted to say conflated. Then she found herself in a place where no words could be said.

She glided forward and put her arms around his shoulders. Neither of them could feel the other, but she imagined what he might feel like beneath her hands. Lean. Hard, knotted muscles from sleeping on the ground and never stretching. And warm. She was always cold, particularly her hands, and he was probably always warm without effort. She saw him raise his arms around her too. The warmth spread.

“I'm sorry,” he muttered.

“You have no need to be sorry.”

She could feel him want to say something. “You didn't...”

“No,” she said firmly, “I did not. I will not again, not unless you ask me to.” She pulled away and looked into his eyes. “I know it is much to ask, to trust me.”

“I trust you.”

Did he mean it? For once, she would have to get used to taking another person at their word and leave it at that. She mused on this. “I don't think I've ever told you this, though I've thought on it many times since I've met you. I find the titles of 'mentor' and 'apprentice' limiting.”

“Why?”

She had never been so close to him. She studied his long, narrow nose, his wild beard, and those soft hazel eyes, like a wolf's. “They imply only one can teach the other.”

* * *

 She was staring at her hands on her lap. As a child, she would often receive comments on her long, slender fingers, ten representations of how tall and slender she was. There was all sorts of speculation of what talents she could best use this advantage for, none of which she ended up pursuing. But for a time, she admired them as others did, for whatever peculiar reasons they had.

Veins protruded from the backs on her hands, meandering snakes, navigating through liver spots where once only a hint of blue could be seen under her pale, soft, unblemished skin. Her pinkies were now crooked, leaning slightly on the inside at the middle joint, and the same was starting to happen to her ring fingers, one of which, when it rained, hurt to bend. Imperfections, because...

 _Old_. She would look back and think on this moment. This would be the time when she realized she, Juno, was no longer the wise youth elected to the Council, but a woman who had passed into the second half of her life without really realizing it. Her hair hung over one shoulder, and if she looked close enough, she could see a few streaks of silver hiding among her thick black tresses. It made her wonder...did Eyvind notice?

One of the children called out and Juno returned to the task at hand. Gilda redirected the affronted student by suggesting a different strategy for threading the needle. All students started at this stage: physically modifying the world. One could not hope to weave a wound shut if they did not know how it felt to sew first, nor build a tower if they did not know block and mortar.

By the end of the lesson, the students were ushered outside for their break. All of them knew what was expected of them, and walked ahead while the two women followed at a distance.

“I have no concerns,” Juno said to Gilda. “You have given them a stable environment. They use their routine to help teach themselves without you. It's the mark of a talented teacher.”

Gilda bowed her head. “Thank you, Valka Juno.”

“I'll pass my report on to the Council to grant your credential...” She stopped when Gilda caught sight of something ahead of them and seemed not to hear her. Juno looked.

Eyvind stood at the mouth of the bridge, leaning on his staff, watching her.

At first she did not understand who it was she was seeing. There was his smile, subdued, uncertain, bashful, restrained, and despite how many times she had seen that smile in their shared dreams, it did not compare to seeing him give to her from across the courtyard, a gesture he played off as natural that could unravel the tapestry.

“I'll excuse myself,” Gilda said, smiling at Juno politely. As she walked on after her students, she nodded to Eyvind, who nodded back. When he returned his sights to Juno, she remembered herself, and came forward to meet him. She tried to cultivate and maintain a facade of mild surprise in midst of a crashing pandemonium that occurred between her ears.

“I did not know you were returning,” she said.

“I wanted to surprise you.”

“Surprise me.”

“I've never seen you surprised. I wanted to.”

“And?”

His eyes moved around her face, a thorough study in art, and something lifted, giving him light, like he had realized a meaning in the picture that he could never quite put into words before.

Nor could he now. The silence stretched until it was too weak to sustain comfort. “I am happy to see you home,” she said, to restore it.

“I am too,” he said, quavering.

She swallowed. “You must want a bath? I'll walk you to them and ensure a room is prepared for you.”

“That can wait until after. Unless you think I need it?”

She shook her head. “Well. We have much to discuss, then. Come.”

She turned and led him up the path towards the tower, and he fell in stride beside her. The urge to look at him had her skin tingling, tiny needles pulling her cheek closest to him by threads. The longer she did not look, the more it pulled. How else could she know what joy was if she did not watch it with her own eyes, walking beside her?

“You came on a good day,” she said, feeling surreal as she said it, as if his arrival was not monumental enough to speak of, over and over. “The whole Council has returned. It is Hrani's birthday tomorrow. We're having a feast tonight to celebrate. It will be an opportune time to announce your homecoming.”

“The whole council has returned for an apprentice's birthday?” he asked as they climbed the spiral stairs.

“A beloved apprentice's birthday. We also intend to conduct meetings, of course. We are planning on taking on more menders as Valka apprentices.”

“How is that possible?”

“Taking on more apprentices?”

“Yes.”

She looked at him at length, slowing her stride on the stairs. “It's possible.”

They arrived at her quarters near the top of the tower, and she weaved the door open as they approached it. Once inside, she hesitated on closing the door, and looked to see if anyone was there to see.

No. Only them.

She shut it softly.

When she turned, she found him standing in the middle of the room like he had when they first met. This time, though, he did not appear like he wanted to run at the first opportunity.

“I found something,” he said, with a slight tremble. He knelt to rummage through his sack.

In his voice there was something...like a fear for the huge darkness below, a knowledge that everyone stood just on the edge of an abyss they were unaware of. It was underscored by the fact he shared no hint of this down by the bridge, nor on their way to this room, and he had waited until the door was closed to bring his fear to light.

He pulled out a scroll and unfurled it. Most scrolls in Manaharr were made of cloth or leather, the letters sewn by weaving. What Eyvind presented to her now was made from papyrus, the markings made from charcoal. He handed it to her.

As soon as she looked at the page, she felt a surge of significance. The emotion was hard to place. It could have been rejoice, closer to exaltation, or great anxiety. Something that should not be observed. She knew this pattern well and did not know it.

“This is not a mender's pattern,” she said, studying them fleetingly. She wanted to look at the lines more closely, absorb the intricacy of his work, but found it unbearable to consider any one line for longer than a moment.

“It's not dredge either.”

“No...it's not.”

“Have you seen anything like this before?”

She did not pause for long. “No.” As soon as she said it she shook her head. She had not lied to Eyvind for a long time, and she would not start again. “Yes.”

“What does it show?”

“I don't know.”

She furled it up, unable to look at its edges any longer. “I will keep this pattern for now.”

“I have other documents to add to the library.”

“How many?”

He gestured to his pack. It was fat and uneven. “Many.”

“I would like to review those materials before I bring them to the Council.”

“Of course.”

“Go, rest awhile. I will take care of these. I will come find you when it is time for the feast.”

He stood still and silent for some time, quite some time, before he nodded and muttered “Yes.” His eyes were flitting.

“Eyvind,” she said softly. Eventually he met her eyes, and she felt it in her heart—that quick jolt, the slow spread in the chest. She smiled. “Welcome home.”

He gave her the same appraising look like he had before, out by the bridge. It lasted too long.

She was about to fill the void with words and move away from him when he turned and left. She watched him go. The feeling that seeped through her did not dissipate, but lingered, solidifying in her chest, like an epitaph engraved into her tomb that would endure eternity.

The scroll he left her weighed no more than a leaf, yet it held the world in between each line that Eyvind drew. Her skin tingled where she felt its light touch under her robe. As if she was being watched by a predator, she tread carefully to Eyvind's pack and carried it to the study stone, wary of what else she might find.

By the time she had finished his findings, she had decided she would not be bringing it to the Council after all.


	5. GODGA, part 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The most important decisions you make are often decided before you even know the question.

She found him just outside the bathhouse, hair still wet from his wash. He turned to her, having just closed the door.

“May we speak in private?” she said.

Eyvind looked around them subtly as if to find an appropriate room. His hand was still on the handle of the door. He motioned to it bashfully. “There's no one else there. We could use one of the rooms...”

She motioned to it. He turned the handle and followed her inside.

The bathhouse was much darker than most of the tower, but a candle or two was all that was really needed, for the rocky walls were always wet, and the light would refract again and again. It was carved from the bedrock on which the tower was formed; a natural vent opened up several feet bellow, and through a convoluted, twisting tunnel, the steam was released safely into the room. No matter the time of year, it was always very warm, just the perfect temperature.

Juno picked the first private room they happened upon. She weaved a flame onto the candle on the edge of the brazier in the centre as Eyvind weaved the door shut.

There was something in the sound of it, the door sealing. A note that was not quite right. She turned to ask him what he had done to the door to find that it had not been locked at all, but screened, so that no one could hear.

“Someone might walk in,” she said. “It's better to lock it.”

Nearly imperceptibly, he shook his head. “I want you to,” he whispered to the door.

“What?”

“You've stopped altogether.”

“Stopped what?”

If that was answer enough, he smiled, gesturing as if to say “see?”

She was gripping her spear tight, her other hand cramped around a fistful of the inside of her sleeve. She knew what he was talking about. When was the last time she had looked into someone's mind, lifted a detail to lighten a load, nurtured a thought to empower a soul? It had been...had it been a year?

“You told me you wouldn't, not unless I asked you to.” He locked his eyes with hers.

It was too easy, though she felt herself give resistance, like she was at the top of a high jump she used to leap off of but had been injured doing it in the past. It was him, though,  _him_ , so like jumping into that still lake, she was submerged into a room full of longing, of happiness so light it made her eyes hurt to look upon him. That familiar unease was still there, but it was subdued, a small voice drowned out by a chorus of joyful reconciliation, and beneath it, an undeniable prurience.

The last time she had encountered this in someone else, she had been another person. Eyvind was her student. Not quite a boy, but...so much  _younger_. Anxiety had her feet shifting as if she could physically escape the truth that she felt the very same as he did. Though she was no longer holding his gaze, his feelings were still there. When she flitted over his face, he was coming closer, and there were tears in his eyes.

Home surrounded her. It still smelled of damp earth, yox, cold air, linseed oil, sweat (even though he had already bathed), and a smell that had no other name but Eyvind, a scent she had not encountered for over two years. No one else was here, no one would see them, no one could remind her how inappropriate this was.

She took a step back.

He stopped. She felt the shift in the atmosphere. That step impregnated the glow with a dark doubt that seeped through the room like blood in water.

His eyes were pointed to her feet, holding them in place until she addressed him.

“I can't,” she said.

“I apologize.”

“You have nothing to...”

He didn't say anything, but kept looking at her feet. Small eyes, but sharp. Wolves' eyes, on a handsome bearded face.

“I want to,” she said, on choked throat. “That cannot go on.”

Eyes still on her feet, he said, carefully, as if he felt every word on his tongue first before he spoke it, “We have passed the point of turning back.” Then he stepped away so that the path to the door was open. Only then did she realize why he had not locked it. A self-fulfilling prophecy, perhaps.

“We need to talk about your findings,” she said.

“I understand. I don't believe I'm of the right mind now. Can we...tomorrow?”

She bowed her head. “Of course,” she said softly. Then she left the bathhouse, meandered to her quarters, and barred herself away. Come time for the dinner, she did not attend. She was almost certain that he did not either.

Hours later, she wandered the darkened halls, her home for so many years, trying to lose herself in the spider-web cracks along the stone, fill the gaps in the mortar with purpose. All the good memories were of Eyvind. She wanted to see him, but she could not go to him. She  _could not_.

The last place she had seen him, where they had been the closest they had ever been, was some where she could go to, at the least. The idea of being there was so weak a gesture to yearn for a person she could never have that it ached like a sore she had left untreated for too long. This would be a battle for the rest of her life. She would go to the bathhouse and lick her wounds in solitude for years to come, she was certain.

When she entered the private room, he was sitting on the bench across form the door. The brazier in the middle of the floor was the only thing that stood between them. A single candle was still lit on it, casting a dim glow over his skin.

All of him.

He did not appear abashed. In fact, she was not either.

He slowly rose from the bench. He was still skinny, but there was more fill to him now than when last she saw him. A sinewy quality relative to wild animals that hunted. His eyes were hunting her now, like she was just as naked as he was.

No, she did not need to look. As soon as she had thought it, she knew. They were laid as bare for one another as they ever would be.

As she stepped forward through the brazier, he took a step forward as well, until they were but a hands-breadth apart. She imagined his breath on her face, his fingertips tracing up her arm. She lowered her hands over his chest and thought about how soft his hair would be there. Then he brought his hands over  _her_  chest, and the thought alone that he would be touching her if this was real was enough to burn her wisdom to ash, a single spark igniting an unstoppable forest fire. He held his lips over hers, and she would have traded in all her secrets to the Council, given up her spirit, and cast her future aside if only she could feel it.

The night was long, and it was just the two of them. No one else.

Only them.


	6. GODGA, part 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their secrets are discovered. Eyvind makes a declaration that costs them both dearly.

The precedent for this was well over a hundred years gone. Was this too little, too late? Or far too much?

He was sitting at the study stone, staring at its surface, hands locked tight together, remembering. This was the room he had been taken to when he was thirteen years old, a prodigy, when he had mistakenly set fire to the docks in Arberrang by lightning, a fire that spread and destroyed homes, lives. This was the room where Juno came to meet him for the first time, soothed his fears, and showed him that there was still warmth in the world to be shared. This was the room where his life began again.  
  
They had learned that life _could_ begin again. For him? For Juno? They could not rewrite destinies. This was it; a life apart.

“Will you come willingly?” Uldhriel said, with an air of foreboding.

Eyvind startled; he had not realized they had arrived. A few members of the Council were there for him, all old men and women who did not understand, would not open their minds to what could be.

He stood but did not look up. Hrani and Varin took to his sides and led him forth. The others parted like curtains from the door. Uldhriel and Tkfa took the lead, while the others took to the train. Together they marched through a tower built too large for them to the Council Chambers.

Each step closer he got, the more nervous he became. A bit of a good feeling, oddly enough. The past day spent in the dormitory had been the longest time they had spent physically apart since his sojourn across the continent. During that time, she would always be in his dreams, at least, either because she entered them or because he built her up, thread by thread, to bring himself comfort. Even though he was marching to his trial now, she would at least be in the room. He could face anything so long as he would be able to hear her voice. A deep, soft sound, tranquility written into music.

When Answur saw them approach, he wove the door open. The chambers were bright today; winter days were ahead of them, and with it came longer, brighter days, one of the few things that made the cold bearable. For a moment, Eyvind felt a rush of relief when the light touched his face. As they rounded the doorway—his heart beating hard, head ringing from anticipation—the relief died.

“Where is Juno?” he said, to anyone who might answer. No one did. He repeated himself, voice quaking, and he strained under the threat of breaking.

Only half of the council had escorted him from the dormitory. The other half, he had assumed, were collecting Juno, but there they sat on their high stone bench, curved in a crescent as to speak to each other and look down upon their petitioners. Or in this case, their prisoner. Dusi sat in the centre, Fjorinn's old seat, looking down upon Eyvind. Shadows were cast across his face as to take away his eyes.

“Eyvind Eerikkison,” Dusi said, voice ringing on the bare stone, “you have been brought to trial before the Council today for the charges laid against you: aiding and abetting in the theft of a godly artifact, and taking part in weaving that was previously strictly forbidden to you. Are there any words you offer in your defence?”

He took measured breaths and held them. “These charges are mislaid.”

“An eye witness declared before the Council that you were weaving to create life. Not but two months ago you were brought before this very Council and instructed it was not within your rights to perform it, and that such an action would lead to this hearing. Furthermore—”

“I was in possession of that staff. I did not aid nor abet anything. I stole it myself.”

Dusi deflated, eyes dark burning coals as he looked between Eyvind and a valka behind him. “I must remind you that you are speaking in _your_ defence, Eyvind, _not_ hers.”

“I concern myself with the validity of the Council's proceedings. I did not 'take part' in the weaving either. I was the weaver.”

“We know she was part of it.”

“You 'know'? What else is being laid on the line based on hearsay?”

“The weaving you were taking part in was not unknown to us,” Zefr interjected. “It was discovered and banned long before you became an apprentice. We know it cannot be performed alone.”

“It was not being performed. I was practicing it.”

“Even after you were prohibited?” she asked.

“Yes.” Eyvind bored his eyes into Dusi's. “The charges imply I was an accomplice. I am the sole perpetrator; they are mislaid.”

It looked as if Dusi's face had been carefully sewn into an obdurate countenance, and at last the strings were frayed enough by Eyvind's words that they snapped apart, one by one, and gave way to a visage full of commiseration. “Is that what you believe?”

“Yes.” He did not need Juno after all. Now he had the upper hand in his own trial.

That feeling evaporated like a drop of water in fire as the Councilers exchanged long, heavy looks with one another. No, he must have misstepped somewhere. What was his error? Juno, where was Juno?

“Thank you for your testimony, Eyvind.” Dusi's spine was curved, his shoulders sagging forward, compressing his lungs and weakening his voice. “You will be escorted back to the dorm until we call upon you again.”

He felt hands curl around his arms, but even with the anticipation of being moved, he still stumbled over his own feet when being led away. The trip back up the tower was far more harrowing than the trip down. Juno would not be there. Juno was not there and he knew in his gut he had made a grievous error somehow. What was it they saw? Why was his hearing cut so short? What did he give them that decided their guilt?

He sat, dead weight, at the study stone, and they left him behind. Even if they hadn't bound the door shut from the other side, he would not have attempted to flee. He needed to stay behind to...what could he do now for her? He had to do something.

He raked his fingernails over his crown and face, harder and harder until he drew blood.

* * *

 

He lay in his bed, resolutely remaining still, yet finding it impossible to fall asleep. The desire to turn over, rearrange his limbs, do anything to find a better position in which to drift off was strong enough to keep him lying awake, helpless and aggravated. He needed to find peace, but knowing what had transpired and what may yet come swarmed him, and it was impossible to locate his dreams.

“Eyvind.”

When he opened his eyes, he was sitting up in bed, but he knew he had somehow fallen asleep, for Juno was standing before him now.

He stood quickly, coming toe to toe with her. “I did something wrong,” he said, searching her face. She too looked much the same as Dusi had.

She smiled. Such a heartbreaking sight. “You did nothing wrong.”

“Have they held your hearing?”

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

“They have found me guilty of altering minds.”

Eyvind remained quiet. He raised his hands to her arms, imagining the feeling of her robe under his skin. “How?”

“It was the staff. Aki had no memory of ever even keeping vigil over its resting place. I went too far. They thought I had done the same to you because you had been so adamant on being the sole offender. My scapegoat.”

“No.” It was a weak, pitiful sound, a whistle from a closed-off throat. He bowed his head. “Did you try to convince them otherwise?”

She hesitated. “I can only make minds stronger, take away that which hinders them, Eyvind.”

“I know.”

“I can't control minds.”

“ _I know._ ” He replaced his hands on either side of her face. If only he could really hold her now. “I'm the last person you need to convince of that.”

“It's only...with Aki, it was the stress of failure that I mended. The staff had been such a source of turmoil for him that I rid him of its burden entirely. The rest of the valka were already prepared for me to try and ease the suffering of condemning one of their own. I could not sway a single thought in those chambers.”

“I'm so sorry.”

“I am too, that I have put you through this.”

“You put me through nothing.” He sought her eyes again. “I'm with you, now and always.”

Tears were welling in her eyes. “My execution is in the morning.”

Eyvind had never experienced the sensation of his heart dropping through his stomach before then.

When his parents had passed away within months of each other, he was only a boy, and he had felt that the world had died with them. At night he was a single soul left drifting on the Vast, cast away to solitude for the rest of his days, and no one would be able to take him back from that, even if he had been rescued. He would be set adrift forever.

Now he had been plunged beneath the sea's surface, destined to drowning, again and again. His legs may as well have shattered beneath him, for he found himself on the floor and could no more feel them than he could feel Juno's arms around him now. She was beside him on the floor, crying with him, and muttered, “You can save me.”

“How?” he choked out.

“They are going to end my life through weaving. My soul will be evicted from my body, then my body will be sealed in the tomb beside Fjorinn. I will be preserved. You will be able to break free from this prison, steal my body, steal the staff, and steal my soul back from Helheim.”

Eyvind had nothing to say in response, because he could not fathom how he would be able to do any of those things. Not without her.

How could they condemn bringing souls back from the dead, yet uphold the practice of taking life away in much the same manner?

She had somehow stopped crying, though tears still trickled down her cheeks. “I know that must seem impossible right now. But you already have the weaving for returning life. I will show you everything you need to do achieve this...if it is something you wish to do.”

“ _Of course I do_ ,” he said fervently. “Why wouldn't I?”

“I ask much of you,” she said. “Your home would be taken from you. You would be an outcast.”

“They are already taking my home from me.” He felt his devastation burning away under something primal. He wanted to hold her, _truly_ hold her, to feel her, make sure she was still real, that they had not already stolen her away from him. “My life is yours. There is no taking us apart.”

“You know I would not ask this of you if I did not think it was important. This is beyond just you and I.”

“No. Nothing is beyond you.”

She gave him such a stare that he was certain the ghost of another person had crossed her face. “Do you know how valka have passed their knowledge on to their apprentices?”

Eyvind held his breath and did not move a muscle. He wasn't sure he would move even if he had command over his own limbs at that moment. “Do it,” he whispered.

She shook her head, eyes wide, mouth thin and bloodless. “No. I decided a long time ago that I could never do that to you.”

“It will save you.”

“It will end you.”

“You must. Juno, _please_. I will take you with me.”

“ _Listen_. I will never pass entirely onto you. When it happened to m—...who I was...you would be _gone_. I could never live in a world without you.” She moved to hold her hand by his cheek. “What I can do is pass very specific memories to you, knowledge of how to leave this prison and obtain the staff. It will be but a tiny fraction of me, a sliver that will hardly change you. I will no longer possess the knowledge; you alone will. It may be painful, but I need to remain with me in this dream for it to work.”

He hesitated. “Did Zefr...?”

“No. She had decided I would be a better asset as my own person. Even if she had decided to, she would not have been able to; someone else bound herself to me long ago.”

“Your grandmother.”

“Yes.”

Eyvind searched her face like he was looking at an entirely different woman he had never seen in all these years. Small things came back to light, odd things she had said...had he ever really known 'Juno' at all?

“Yes,” she said softly, an eager tenderness creeping back into her voice. “It's me. It's always been me.”

He was crying again. “Of course. I'm sorry.”

She held her hands over one of his, and he moved it for her as if she was really holding it. “You will never be sorry for anything.” Then she held her lips over his, and both of them closed their eyes, wishing they could feel it.

When she pulled away, he stared into her eyes. How he wanted to touch her, _really_ touch her. In all this time, it had only ever been in dreams, where they could not feel one another. The least he could do is lose himself in her gaze. “Do it,” he said.

_I love you,_ he heard in his mind when the searing began.

* * *

He woke with a start. Had he heard her scream? Or was that the throb in his head? The migraine was unprecedented. He clutched at his crown and groaned. The pain was unbearable enough that he could not rise.

_Eyvind._

Involuntarily, he jolted upright, and called her name out to the room.

“My execution is in the morning,” she had said.

He bolted for the door, pounding his fists upon it, pulling with all his might at the handle. Muted as well as bound. He screamed and beat himself upon the stone.

_I need to hear you. Please._

“JUNO!” he howled as loud as he could. He ran back to the window and cried out her name even more, bellowing from his gut, so loud he felt his vocal cords strain.

In return, he heard her shriek, both in his ears and between them. Never had there been such an abhorrent sound to bring him to his knees in all his life; nothing nearly so shattering as when the sound abruptly stopped.

Eyvind had been a timid, weary boy. Always wanting to do well by all, protect and serve the public, he had set a standard for himself to achieve to the best of his ability. He had been incapable of crime, petty or severe, and no one would have ever believed he would intentionally commit murder.

Both he and Juno were gone in that instant, and neither of them would come back again.


	7. HAGALAZ, part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They came for relaxation but found a curse.

Asmund lifted the sunstone to the sky once more and peered through it. Clouds thick as mountains stood between him and the sun, but the light passed through them to reveal a solitary circle hanging high in the sky, cut clean in his stone. He did not lower it for some time.

Folka emerged from the mead hall and saw him standing alone on the street. “Still playing with that old mans' toy?” He did not give her a response. “Are you going to stand there all day looking at the sky or come back in for a drink?”

Asmund turned to stare at her and handed over the eyepiece. She gave him a searching look before raising the sunstone and peering through it herself. First she scanned the western sky, then swept around in a semicircle. Doubt in her heart, she lifted it to high noon.

She lowered the stone and stared at the overcast sky in the place she had seen the sun. A cold sort of fear held her by the spine, the sort one feels when learning the gods had slaughtered each other.

“You think so too?” Asmund said quietly.

She handed the stone back and followed suit on his dulcet tone. “It’s hard to say. When was the last time you checked?”

“Long enough ago.”

“Have you shown anyone else this?”

“No.”

“Don’t.”

Asmund nodded. “I wonder if this is the gods' doing somehow.”

Folka sneered. “You sound like a woman.” She used her wounding words to strip herself of her own fear and leave it there with him.

She rounded the hall and found a secluded copse of trees jutting out from the ravine to use as a privy. Being a varl town for the most part, the few places of suitable size for a human to empty her bladder were occupied. She very well could have sought another spot if she wanted to climb a house-sized chair and risk falling in while she did her business.

The air was cold on her bare skin, but it wasn't anything she wasn't used to. Half of her life had been spent outdoors in the cold, pissing on trees and chopping them down. It had been in a forest like this where Folka had first met Bolverk, just coming out of hibernation, because for some reason he wanted to believe he was a Cold Bear rather than a varl. Now it would be in a forest like this she would see him sleep for another winter. Much of his Ravens were going to stay and wait for him here, and those living in Karlshus tolerated this idea, so long as the mercenaries worked for their place. Folka didn't mind chopping wood for another season—she was good at that. But she didn't want to have to.

Halfway back to the meadhouse she saw him emerge, a great hulking mass covered in a white fur cloak, with tangled black hair poking out from on top. Bolverk rarely ever drank, let alone ever entered halls like this—this last feast was for the Ravens to sing their songs over ale and he to fill his belly before a long sleep, but there was only so much noise and crowding he could take before he was itching to swing his axes Claw and Fang around to clear up some room.

At least, Folka knew this. She'd been fighting at his side for years now. Asmund had only spent a half year with them, and did not yet know when to be invisible to his leader. She saw him say something and hand the sunstone to Bolverk. From here she could see the varl tense with rage; she imagined the snort he would give. Her approach grew quicker when he looked through the stone, tracing the same path she had in the sky.

The growl met her ears right before he turned and hurled the sunstone on top of the house. Asmund stepped back, a look on his face like he'd realized Bolverk could have tossed him up there just as easily.

“Already tired of looking at the sun?” Folka said as she approached.

Bolverk looked down on her and snorted. “Faen thing's useless.”

“What do we do?” Asmund said.

“What did I tell you about that stone?” Folka said to the boy. She stood a whole head taller and had a neck twice the size of his, and she could see him want to shrink before her in response but reared up instead because of his young, manly pride.

“And keep it from our leader?”

Assertive, at least.

She brought the butt end of her spear down on his boot. He cringed and doubled over, silent. “You passed it up the chain of command to me. You then went against my orders. That's the last time you do.”

“When were you going to tell me about it?”

She turned to Bolverk, shrugging. “What were you supposed to do? Threaten it into moving again?”

Bolverk narrowed his already small eyes at her. He turned to Asmund. “Get back inside. There's nothing to be done for it.”

Asmund did as he was bid, hiding his limp well as he went. “You have to spend a winter with that boy,” Bolverk said. “Don't make him hate you this early.”

“I can't make anyone hate or love me. I can make them fall in line, though. I'm good at that.” She looked up at the sky. “Have you ever seen anything like this?”

If anyone had, she would trust a varl to know. The oldest known giants were hundreds of years old. Even though Bolverk was not even half the age of the oldest, he still had lived ten of her lifetimes over already. He looked down the street rather than back up at the sky. Another varl was standing outside his house, lacking a sunstone but possessing suspicion as he looked up.

“No,” Bolverk said after some time.

She stuffed her next thought down next to the flippant opinion she had given Asmund. “Well, you don't have to deal with it much longer, anyway. Let's go finish your party and send you off.”

One would not have guessed it pained her to say it, rather it seemed she could not be rid of her employer soon enough. Bolverk flicked his wrist and gave a shiver. His silence was answer enough.

She wandered back into the mead hall without him. At least, it was named a hall, but it was as big as the palace in Arberrang, with a rest wing, two kitchens, and enough seats to house just about every varl in the north. Inside, all were boisterous, except for Asmund, who sat at a table with some of his fellow Ravens, nursing his cup like he was thinking hard on not throwing up into it. The windows were small, few between, and mostly covered by skins. A fire roared in every yox-sized hearth from one end of the hall to the other. For all these people knew it was night outside. Given the amount of time they had spent here pissing away their coin, it should have been sunset at the earliest.

“Aye,” Sparr cried loudly from one table, standing up on his bench and holding his drink high in the air, “then the Loom-mother rolled over in her grave to give a great fart, and the sound woke the other gods from death. The ground shook violently as varl and man alike ran for their lives and their noses, while the rest of us dived under our tables and drank the rest of our mead, for fear the stench would kill us before we finished.”

This had the other Ravens crying, stitches in their sides. Even a few varl that shared their table were laughing. Despite the omen hanging above them outside, Folka cracked a smile, scoffing at the ludicrous tale. Even when she thought she heard all the old man's crazy stories, he somehow produced another one more fantastical than the last. He took a great gulp of mead, resurfaced to laugh at his own joke, and started hacking up phlegm. She sat down at their table and Gibu passed her a full cup of mead.

“Our friend Kvig wants t'know the story about how Bolverk lost his horns,” he said to her. “Given that his have yet to grow in, he c'n hardly understan' why one would want t' part with them.”

Folka looked over at the varl next to Gibu. He looked like a very overgrown boy; stubs of horns were growing out of his forehead, fuzz lined his soft jaw. Folka had never seen a varl so young before. She did not break his inquisitive stare as she drank deep, noting that his face didn't sour as she did it. Still young enough yet that he hadn't learned to look down on humans with contempt like his counterparts.

 _They're more useful to me in my hands than on my head_ , Bolverk had told her once.

“What makes you think he 'parted with them'?” she said, her voice deepening.

“Most varl I know wouldn't ever let anything get near his face, let alone that beast,” he said. Even his voice was smooth like a young man's.

“How old are you?”

“Older than you.”

Ah. There was the contempt. “If you ever found out about Bolverk's horns, he'd make sure you never grew any.”

“I'd believe it. He's a berserk, isn't he?” Folka lifted an eyebrow, surprised Kvig let the threat roll off his skin so easily. “I heard Hardborg would experiment with deadlier and deadlier beasts when he made each varl. That's why some of them are just enraged all the time. By the time he got to me he must have decided to tone it down since most of his varl seemed to be flinging themselves into death that way.” Very abruptly, his face fell, and he lifted his flagon to his mouth instead of continuing the conversation. Folka's disapproval of him turned quickly to pity.

Gibu clasped a hand on the varl's large arm, as close as he could get to reaching Kvig's shoulder. He raised his cup. “May the varl live 'nother thousan' years.”

 _May any of us live another day_ , Folka thought, raising her own cup and drinking deep with the others. With the mood souring so quickly she was brought back to the sun hanging in the sky overhead.

“Oh, we're playing that game?” Sparr yelled. “The Ravens were caught in a year-long winter back when I still had baby fat to shed. Blizzards trapped us in caves with Bloodaxe for months at a time. Whenever we would void our bowels we would use it to light a fire, then curse dead Irynx for the storm and Radomyr for the rotten luck.”

Laughter returned to the table. A varl on the other end added, “Sometimes the yox piss trough runs dangerously close to the watering hole on a ranch, and a varl can't tell the difference when _he_ is piss drunk—”

This continued on for some time, and it silenced Folka to think on how much time _had_ passed, and how they would ever be able to tell.

“Where is that great hulk of a bear, anyway?” Gibu asked in the middle of a conversation Folka had not heard. “He leave in the middle of his own party?”

This made Folka's stomach sink. “I'll go check on him,” she said.

Crossing the hall took more effort than it had the first time, now that most men and varl were too far gone to recall their wits. Some of them were locked into a conversation so engrossing that one varl did not notice when his neighbour behind him sloshed ale on his sleeve. Their faces were drawn, their voices curt. Folka could not forget their look as she took a large breath and stepped outside.

It had gotten even brighter out, the clouds having cleared some. The streets were filled with more varl and men looking up, but Bolverk was nowhere in sight. Most varl wore boots so over-padded as to make their feet unusually huge, but Bolverk's were unmistakably slender, and those footprints rounded the meadhouse for the copse. She followed the tracks and stood on the edge of the trees, looking in.

“To the depths with you,” she muttered. She should not have been expecting anything more from him but she did. She was his right hand, and he'd left her behind with the rest of them like she was no different. Cut off like his horns.

The longer she stood there, the more it rankled. She would not leave. It shred ribbons from her heart, tore her memories apart, brought an axe down on what she had built for him, over and over. When she heard most of the other Ravens emerge from the hall simply to look up at the unmoving sun and mutter to each other like frightened women, she left it all behind at the edge of the wood and went to remind them who they were.


	8. HAGALAZ, part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sun is not the only curse.

“Winter days are long.”

“The sun still sets in the winter, if only for a little while.”

“The world has been changing these last hundred years. This could be another change.”

“Or this could be the beginning of the end.”

The optimistic varl had no reply to this. They both looked up into the sky again as Folka passed them, axe slung over one shoulder. It had been two sleeps since Bolverk left to hibernate and half the Ravens had gone off to do private contracts or find kin living nearby. Those that were left seemed to forget how to enjoy a drink or swing an axe. Those that could still keep useful kept to themselves. Folka decided to do just the same, and went to cut lumber for Karlshus's many hearths.

The ravine that had been slated for clearing was just outside the city limits. The trees looked like they had been there as long as Folka had been alive—not too tall nor small, but large enough to handle on her own and provide a few good fires each. No one else was there yet. It was Folka's morning but others' evening. When the sun stopped moving, time was the first thing to die, and no one could agree on when it would have been any longer.

It had been at least three years since she last swung an axe this way, but when she brought hers across a tree the first time, it was as if she had never stopped. The familiar sound it made brought back memories of home, of eating onion stew by a good fire with Father, of so many years spent yearning for someone else in the village to notice her, not as the beast of a woman working as a lumberer, but as—

In the far distance, _his_ roar.

Before the sound even finished, she was running. Without shield or spear, she flew through the trees and down into the ravine, not knowing what she would find but more certain of what she would do when she got there. She slipped twice in her haste and jumped several feet down the rest of the decline when she heard him yell a second time.

Claw and Fang sang against what must have been steel. Wearing a plate and going against a bare-chested varl may have seemed like an easy target, if the Cold Bear cloak did not get to them. Around the next turn, she saw a cave mouth, heard his growl, and lunged.

Bolverk's back was to her. Facing him from within, tall, dark shapes, covered in stone, with glowing yellow eyes.

It was shock that held her in place when she saw them. The thought of having so easily abandoned her shield and spear now rang in between her ears, loud and shrill, as she realized she was facing monsters she had only ever heard Bolverk talk about. The smallest of the dredge was still a head taller than her; the largest, several more than Bolverk, too large to stand tall in the cave. They were over a hundred years gone; they were inching closer to him now.

“Bolverk!”

He did not take his eyes off them. “Get behind me!” he yelled.

She didn't dare disobey this order. Angled behind his legs so that she could keep one eye on the stone behemoths, she held her axe at the ready, other arm before her as if her shield was strapped to it. One of the dredge had deep scratches in its armour from Bolverk's axes, while Bolverk himself had a bloody arm. Even though she and Bolverk were outnumbered, the dredge rocked on their feet, small, quick movements, glowing eyes darting between the two of them as if they were the greater threat.

Were these bandits or varl, she would charge. Had she her shield, she would have pressed in and broken their cluster. But these were the beasts of nightmares, and both parties stood hesitant at an impasse. “Bolverk,” she pleaded.

“Too many,” he growled. He did not gain ground or give it up, but stood waiting for them to make their move.

“Let's run,” she said.

“No!”

“We can't do this.”

“I won't leave them alive!”

The dredge continued to shuffle, eyes darting between one another, low vibrations emanating from each of them.

“Faen,” she breathed, then gave her own battle cry and charged in.

Bolverk shouted something. All the dredge flinched and backed away. She made for the largest one, axe reared back, and brought it across the back of its knee. It dropped, the others scattered, and Bolverk flung himself into the fray, bellowing loud enough to make one of the dredge cower.

All the battles Folka had fought since Bolverk took her into the Ravens were not like this. They had always been in control, and worked apart the enemy's defences like tearing down a fort wall by wall. This was panicked chaos, where each swing of the axe was two steps ahead of her own thoughts. Neither she nor they were in control of this fight.

Suddenly there was a boom behind her eyes, then a distant ringing, and a sharp numbness where the blow had landed. She found herself on the ground, blood trickling into her eye.

Bolverk was _on_ them, Claw and Fang a grey storm. The dredge were trying to swing back; the blows would land but Bolverk would only swing harder. She pushed herself up, wiped the blood from her face, and fumbled for her axe, charging back in.

Death was near, she was drenched in sweat, and her winter cloak was dyed with her own blood, yet it was joy that took her.

They brought down another dredge together, then another, each one quicker than the last. The large one was left, brandishing a large fork. It was barring the exit of the cave, closing Bolverk and Folka in towards the back, yet it was the dredge that shrank before them. With a manic sort of strength, it struck its weapon on the cave walls. The metal sang, a warbling tune, one that made the hairs on Folka's skin rise and Bolverk growl. “It's calling for others!”

More blood oozed into her eye. She closed it, grimacing, and trained the other on the dredge. It swung its fork too wildly to get close, and although she saw it as a rabid monster, she knew the language of desperation well enough to see it screaming from its yellow eyes.

Desperation spoke to her as well. Without really knowing what she was doing, she hurled her axe.

The blade ricocheted off its helmet, the impact great enough that it stumbled, the warbling tune ceasing.

Bolverk closed in.

Though dredge were covered in stone, the last one broke apart as if the armour was made from crumbling dirt where Bolverk bashed its face in. It was this way that Folka learned the night-skinned dredge were built just like man and varl on the inside. They bled black, but bled like anything else all the same.

He wiped his axes off on his leather apron, looking down at the bodies. “It's been a while since I saw slag last.” He booted the smallest one, nearer Folka. “These are young. Or their women. Didn't know they had women.”

“They came from deeper in the cave?” Folka asked, her voice sharper than she intended as she pressed on her head wound.

“Must have.”

She nodded to his arm that had taken the brunt of the damage. “Do dredge use poison?”

“Not last time we fought.”

That would mean Bolverk wouldn't have his wound tended to. He healed the bear way—without salve or thread.

“Not staying in this cave, are you?” she said.

“What do you think?”

“Good. Let's get back.”

He snorted, making her pause. It was not often she misread her captain.

“Unless you want to wake up next spring to find yourself dredge meat.” She looked down on the bodies, feeling a distant suspicion still, though their eyes were shut and the yellow glow gone forever.

“Slag come up through fissures all the time. I always wake up.”

Still looking at the dredge, she said, “The sun hasn't moved.” It was the closest she had ever let weakness seep into her tongue around him.

“Good. Maybe it will be the end of dark months.”

She stared at him with heated eyes. “You're staying, then.”

His growl was short, sharp, and colder than the air outside. “When was the last time you saw me stay awake for the winter?”

“You don't give a yox shit what happens, do you?”

“Ravens have seen worse. You're a Raven. Act like it.”

Folka released the tension in her fist enough to collect her axe. She could not stem the bleeding, so she kept her eye shut and aimed the other at him. It was one thing to wake a bear from his sleep, another to oust him from his home. “Then may the dredge take you, faen fool.”

He charged her, his roar ricocheting off the walls again and again so that it sounded as if there were ten of him.

She would not have budged if there were a hundred.

He stopped inches from her, snorting with rage, his grey bone axes gripped tightly in each fist, held at a threatening angle.

“Out,” he snarled.

Without taking her eyes away, she quietly sidestepped him. Each of her footfalls were soft, yet they rang off the stone like the opening beat of a war march.

The walk home was long, shortened only by the rage and hateful thoughts that consumed her. When she made it back to the outskirts of the ravine, she did not seek out the other Ravens, or the healers for her head wound. She stood before the tree she had been chopping when she first heard Bolverk's cry and continued her work. Soon the tree was felled. She kept chopping until she was hacking splinters.


	9. HAGALAZ, part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The dredge return.

Yox were scarce in Karlshus, so in its place Folka and Asmund hauled a cart of lumber across homesteads, delivering wood for the winter. At the end of their route was the governor's house, and today the governor, Råde, stood outside his door watching them approach.

“How many times are you two going to haul that thing up and down the Red Walk?” he asked when they were close enough.

They set down the cart handles and looked up. Even for a varl he was humongous—the tallest Folka had ever seen, but also the fattest. Most varl she saw had rotund bellies from centuries of drinking more mead than water but Råde looked as if he had swallowed one of those varl whole.

“All winter, I suspect,” she said. “However long that lasts.”

“It's painful to watch you do this. It would be much more efficient for one of the other varl to make the deliveries. He could haul more wood too.”

Folka shrugged. “Then get one of them to do it with me. I'm keeping busy, same as any man.”

“Man?”

Asmund sniggered quietly but not quietly enough. She grimaced at him fierce enough to shrink his danglers before turning back to Råde. “Man, woman. I've never known a varl to care about the difference.”

Råde shrugged. “Fair enough. Leave the cart. I'll unload it and bring it back to you.”

She nodded and turned, Asmund in tow. When they rounded a house along the path she turned and hit Asmund so hard upside the head that he fell into a snow drift. Then she turned him over on his other side so that he could hear her through an ear that wouldn't be ringing.

“You're new. You're young. You're a faen shitty little boy. You're here because we think we can make something of you. But undermine me in front of your betters ever again and I will make something out of you.”

For good measure, she shoved his head further into the snow pile and pushed off him to get back up to her feet. “I do not make threats I do not intend to keep.” Then she walked away from him. It did not make her feel any better, doing that. She did what she had to, though, to fill the gap Bolverk left behind.

She headed back to the glen they had been clearing for the past few days (a varl in town had told her it had been about that long since the sun stopped, he was certain) and picked up the axe again. Chopping was easy and methodical enough that it gave her space to think. Today it was nothing but the bleak. What would she do if this was the end of the world? Well, come what may, she would be dead, and it wouldn't matter anymore. That would be fine. If it wasn't the end of the world, would the sun ever set again? How would they measure time then? Would the winter ever end, or would it be endless? Whatever the future may be, wherever she would go, it would only be people like Asmund at the end of the road waiting for her.

She had prepared enough wood to transport again, but Asmund nor Råde had come back after the last delivery. So she planted her axe in a stump and walked back up the Red Walk to retrieve her cart. The path passed through a small bit of the grove that lined Karlshaus, and as she passed through the trees on her way to the governor's house, she found Asmund's corpse on the lined path, his head bashed in.

Ever since Bolverk's run-in, she had taken to carrying her shield with her everywhere. She shrugged off the straps on her shoulders and bound it to her left arm. A spared glance is all she gave the boy before she ran up to warn Råde.

The door to his longhouse was ajar.

She ran up to it, stopped, tiptoed up the steps, paused to listen in the doorway. She could not hear a sound. Back behind her she looked at the foot prints. No fight had broken out in front of the house. Råde's massive tracks led from the cart, half-emptied, to the rear of the house. Crouched, she hugged the wall and followed them.

Råde lay prone in the snow behind his house. The lumber that had been in his arms lay strewn about the ground around his head, the back of which had been caved in. She searched for tracks but found none other than his.

She kept her eyes on the trees as she backed away from the scene, silently as she came. When she came about the front of the house again, she turned.

Something small was flying at her head, and she would not have seen it had it not been bright blue. She raised her shield and the rock shattered. The impact shocked her forearm, rendering it numb. She dropped her arm and caught a glimpse of black sliding between the houses.

“DREDGE!”

It was a particular sound she had told herself she would never make, a sound she knew that would be distinct enough to attract the attention of all the men and varl in Karlshaus.

She screamed it, again and again, and another stone flew at her. She raised her shield to protect her head and raced towards the mead hall. If she had learned anything in Bolverk's cave, it was that she could not face this enemy alone.

Another rock flew. This one shattered, the fragments scratching her cheek. Already on the path ahead she could see varl emerge from their homes, weapons in hand. She flew by Asmund's body. “The trees!” she shouted.

The varl fell in together and wended through the houses to the north, and a battle cry rose up as the first of the dredge were spotted there. As Folka drew nearer, she caught sight of just how many dredge there were.

The mead hall. Her spear was stored there with the other effects of the Ravens. It was already hurting to run but she ran harder. Her comrades were already rushing to arms, out of formation and rank.

She rounded the corner.

The mace fell quick but sloppy, like the dredge had been caught by surprise. Snow and dirt showered her, and when she righted she saw a dredge barely taller than her, mace still in the ground, yellow eyes large. It swept its weapon sideways at her, like swatting at a very large insect in a panic, and she kicked backwards and flattened herself to avoid the blow. When she avoided the next strike, she remained on both feet. The dredge was bent in half.

She rammed the ridge of her shield into its hip. The jam ran up her arms, the wood splintered, and the dredge stumbled. Shield rendered useless, she dropped it and ran for the hall.

It was empty and destitute, but her spear was by the door. As soon as she had her hands on it, she heard the roar.

In that instant, she knew the battle had changed.

The dredge came into the giant hall after her. She fled to the back, weaving between tables. Like her, it moved quickly, but lumbered awkwardly over a bench in the middle of the aisle. She ran up the steps to the raised level, then beat open a window on the western wall. As she jumped through, the dredge swung for her, cracking the frame hard enough to tear it off.

A varl stood over her in the snow and clobbered the small dredge hanging out of the hall. Then the battle song reached her ears. The varl joined the fray, chanting with her fellow Ravens. Now they formed a long line, shoulder to shoulder. Those with shields overlapped them with the man next to him.

Jostled but unharmed, she stood and began to sing as well, hoisting her spear and flowing into order where before had been disarray.

And there he was, covered in blood black as his hair, axes in hand. Even as he swung, berserk and addled, he brought an assurance to the panic, an odd calm where one did not belong. Facing dozens of scattered dredge, she joined the line, and the call of corpse hall turned from her to her enemies.

* * *

 The snow in the ravine was now black as the night sky. So, too, were clothes and faces blackened. A morbid mountain of slag was being piled up on the outskirts of Karlshaus, where Ravens helped folk drag the dead, though they were battle-weary and bone-tired.

Folka approached him from behind. The Cold Bear cloak was stained, but not as badly as she would have thought. He was coming down from his rage, snorting and stomping.

“They got Asmund,” she said, ten feet back.

He spun on her. Snot mingled in his beard and his teeth were bared. It took him some time to close his mouth and relax his shoulders.

“Who else?”

“Governor Råde.”

Bolverk snorted.

“Did you collapse the cave behind you?”

He grunted. “There aren't any other places they can come from now.”

“Nowhere for you to sleep?”

He narrowed his small eyes.

“Good. We get back to work.”

He took a step towards her. Then another. She craned her neck, unflinching.

Glaring down at her, he growled, “Karlshaus needs refortifying. Get our Ravens in line.” He headed for the hall.

_Our_.

There, in that moment, had she never felt more victorious.


	10. NAUTHIZ

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reluctantly, Rook takes his daughter hunting.

Alette toyed with the bracelet about her slender wrist, the bracelet which a mother she hardly knew had woven for her as a fledgling. “I've been practicing.”

Her father Rook looked at her tiredly. It could have been indignation. It could have been surprise or utter joy, really. For a long time, he only ever looked—and sounded—tired. “How?”

“Oddleif.”

She could see the juggling playing out on his bagged eyes. When? When he was hunting. How? Oddleif was the woman raised as a son, the prodigal archer who protected her village as the chieftain's wife, and in some capacity was a mother to Alette.

He said, “How long?”

“Since my tenth birthday.”

“Alette.” It was the tone he used when he thought he ought to be angry, that he should behave as such even though he no longer held the capacity for it. “I can't have you come with me.”

She was twisting the bracelet now. “I'm sorry, I shouldn't have brought it up.”

“I only want to keep you safe.”

“I know.” She looked away, eyes filling with tears.

He sat beside her heavily. For quite some time, the only sound was that of the leather and wool twisting at her wrist.

“We had talked about teaching you, someday.”

Alette looked at him. He never spoke of her mother. In fact, ever since she was recognized as a woman in Skogr, they hadn't really talked about anything at all. She was afraid to say something yet wary of remaining silent. She held the bracelet close to her chest. “You did?”

He continued to look at the floor of their hut, then gave a heavy sigh. He reached over for her hand but fell short, placing it on the bench between them. “I'm sorry.”

“It's all right, Dad.”

“I couldn't...”

“I know.”

“I should have taught you.”

“I understand.”

She put her hand on top of his. He hooked his thumb over top her slender fingers. His skin was as rough as stone. Again, she allowed him time to gather what he needed in order to speak. “Why did you keep it secret for so long?”

This time, it was she who needed time to gather her breath. “When I was little, Oddleif told me it would be our little secret, not to mention it to you. I suppose...I knew why.”

His tired face fell, eyes red-rimmed and glistening. He had grown so old, and they had drifted too far apart, like a boat that had not been properly anchored nor watched.

“Why now, Alette?”

She averted her gaze. “I heard you talking with Bjarte.” She took her hand back, holding it close to her chest again. “I know you're doing what is expected, but...that's not me.”

Again, a long, over-stretched silence. “You know I just want what's best for you.”

“Maybe what's best for me is to be closer to you right now, not further away in someone else's home.”

Some time later, he said. “I'll have you with me, then.”

She wanted to smile and hug him but she could only nod. Like everything else he said and did, he said these words so solemnly, like she was a burden he would bear with a withdrawn sense of duty. “Thank you,” she said meekly.

He stood and left the hut, the cold air drifting in to an already frigid room.

* * *

“Alette.”

She rolled over and squinted at him.

“Time to go.”

She stifled a groan as she slipped out from under the covers. It felt like she had only slept for a handful of hours. Now that the sun wasn't moving, it was impossible to tell. Perhaps he couldn't sleep either and decided it was simply easier to get this over with.

She dressed quietly, eyes lidded and hard to open, as he came in and out of the hut to load their cart and harness the yox. When ready, they both washed their faces and necks in the basin, then slipped out soundlessly into the cold daylight.

As they walked away from Skogr, Alette kept looking over her shoulder, then silently at Rook. Normally, he would take a few other hunters with him on trips. Yet now they grew farther and farther away from anyone's home and Alette grew less certain of the journey ahead of them.

They were headed to the buck forest to the east, a plentiful place that had few wolves or bears this time of year. This was not lost on Alette, and even though she thought it a reasonable decision, she still found herself resentful, especially as they stopped along the way to pick wild tubers and berries.

Not long into the trip (had it been an hour or three?) her feet grew sore. Long after she had wanted to ask to rest, two blisters popped on her heels. A couple snared rabbits after they did stop, she still said nothing, drinking and eating in the silence that had grown huge since he woke her that morning. She had never walked for so long in her life but she was more willing to suffer in silence than give him any reason to return her home.

“I'm sorry,” he said, softly shattering the silence.

She looked at him but said nothing.

“I am being unworthy,” he added.

“It's all right,” she lied.

He shook his head, then finally looked at her for the first time since she had asked him to go. He quickly looked away again, as if holding her gaze was too heavy to bear. “You've done nothing wrong,” he muttered.

She waited.

“I don't know what to do,” he said. Alarm prickled at her neck, made hairs stand on end. She did not know what to do either, when he sounded that way.

“Do what you do when you are with the other hunters,” she suggested.

“That's not what I mean.” He glanced at her. “Though, about the others...I did not tell them about this trip on purpose. Only Bjarte and Iver.”

“Dad...is this just for me? Or are we helping Skogr?”

“Of course we're helping.”

“Just the two of us?”

“I thought it might be better.”

“Better?”

“To...” He huffed, long and slow. “I don't know.”

Alette stared at him for quite some time, while he hung his head. “How did it come to this?” she muttered.

He looked ready to say something several times, but never made a sound.

Memories of the two of them spilled forth like a weakened barrel breaking, of dancing together around the yule log, catching grasshoppers to bring to him for luck, listening to night-fire stories and playing pretend as menders and gods. She swallowed hard.

“You're like her.” He pointedly looked away. “I think that was why I kept leaving.”

She was tearing at a fingernail. “No one ever told me how.”

“It was during the blizzard.”

“But she didn't die from the cold.” At first she had believed that as a girl, but the averted gazes, the stiffened nods of sympathy, and the awkward aversion to speak of it led to her realizing otherwise.

He eventually shook his head.

Some time later, she stood. He followed. Wordlessly, they continued on. Before, from childhood to now, when she was determined to know how her mother died, she had imagined she would find peace, a sort of closure that would empower her and bring her closer to the late mother she knew little of. As they walked the hunting path, she kept imagining a woman like herself walking alone, cloak wrapped about her face to protect against the elements, enough to block her eyes and ears from oncoming doom. Again and again, she pictured it; again and again, she felt no more enlightened or closer to anyone than she had before.

Then Rook's hand was on her shoulder. Without looking at her, he raised a finger to his lips, then pointed. Thirty paces off, through layers of foliage, Alette could see a stag grazing, unaware of their presence. She looked to her father, and he pointed to their left, drawing his bow. She let him lead the way.

Rook snaked them ever closer but would refrain from closing in. Then they would crouch and wait, moving only after the stag had moved. Several times, Alette reached for an arrow, but Rook would hold up his hand. With each passing minute, which neither of them could properly measure any longer, Alette began to grip her bow more and more tightly.

They came to a creek where the stag drank, head low, unaware of its predators. Instead of reaching for an arrow this time, Alette remained crouched, watching Rook. Hesitantly, he crept around the bushes, looking for a close, acceptable gap in which to shoot. Alette eyed her target through the bushes. It was a little more than a stone's throw away.

With distance between her and her father, she plucked the arrow from her quiver and nocked it, shifting her feet for better balance.

Leaves rustled beneath her. The deer shot up, ears perked and eyes in her direction. Rook turned to her at the same time, his expression much like the stag's. Then the creature was bounding off for the trees, Rook was cursing, and Alette shot up straight, drew her arrow, and fired.

The stag faltered but kept moving. There was a rustle, then a great thud as the beast toppled over, unseen.

Alette looked over at Rook, wondering what she would find there. Deep down, she was hoping for admiration, or perhaps pride. She would have even taken chastisement. Disappointment would have been welcome—anything but that withdrawn, stoic lethargy.

He nodded, motioned forward, and cut through the bushes. All the joy taken from her success, she cut through the bushes and headed for the stag.

At first all she saw was a giant, looming black shape, and she thought she was seeing a varl swathed in black. Even still believing this, impulse drove her to throw herself behind the nearest tree. Before she knew it, her father was next to her as well, axe already in hand, held like a threat.

“Where did that thing come from?” Alette whispered.

Rook shushed her softly. “Stay close.”

From the corner of her eye, she could see the shadow of the monster lifting the dead stag over its shoulder, inspecting the arrow Alette had shot, pinched between massive finger and thumb. It lowered its hand, then the shadow moved closer to them.

Alette shrunk like all her joints where trying to close in, make her small, disappear from danger. “I think it saw us!”

Rook said nothing, but grabbed a fistful of her cloak and pulled her away from the tree. They ran back over the creek towards their cart. The yox gave a jolt when it saw them running towards it, and yanked hard on the bindings. The cart lurched then toppled over, sending food preserves and water skins tumbling through snow and grass. The fall had broken the harness, and the yox ran.

“Get behind the cart,” Rook said. He led her there and planted his axe in the ground to redraw his bow. Alette peered from around the cart's edge. The giant, whatever it was, stayed hidden behind the trees, a massive black shadow with a pair of glowing eyes. It did not advance on them, but shifted on uncertain feet. Then Rook fired an arrow.

The stag was thrown to the side. Branches burst forth and snapped from their trees, leaves flew, and the dredge—could it be a dredge?—was drawing a fork as tall as she was.

Alette sprung away from the cart as the fork landed, splinters flying from a broken beam. She drew an arrow and squared her shoulders.

“ _Go!_ ” her father screamed. He was on the other side from her, and he swung his axe into the dredge's knee. It skittered away, taking another swing at him. They danced around each other nervously. All sense had fled when the cart was upset. Alette had not moved since her father had told her to flee, but she had desperately wanted to. Something rooted her to the spot, and so there was only one course of action to be taken. She raised her bow, drew back from her chest, and loosed.

The arrow came perilously close to its eye but did not connect. The dredge turned to her, looking nothing if not startled. Rook wordlessly yelled, waving her away, then swung with his axe again, glancing off a plate. The dredge rushed Rook, toppling him over, then came for her.

She drew another arrow but fumbled it through suddenly slick fingers. Eyes on her target, she lined up her shot, then raised her bow arm, scarcely breathing.

Rook drove the axe as hard as he could twice on its lower back. The dredge halted and turned, revealing a thin crack running down its back to a hollow opening at the base of its armour.

Her arrow struck true, without her realizing she had fired. The dredge arched, a hand reaching behind it as it staggered. It fell to its knees, and Rook darted behind to deliver a blow, again and again, black spewing everywhere, until the dredge was down and unmoving.

Was it the fear of the attack that had her heart pounding? The alarm of coming face-to-face with a monster she and her father had only ever heard of? Or was it that she could still feel the bowstring on her fingers from the arrow she had fired? She held a tight fist and hid it from her father, who approached her quickly, gripping her arm and looking hard into her eyes. He was splattered with black, a ghastly sight. Amongst the guilt, of which she was uncertain where it came from, she petulantly thought _I must not look weak_. It was important to prove her place there, still.

“Was that...a dredge?” she asked, even though she was certain of the answer now.

“It was. Let me see...” He looked her over. “Are you hurt?”

He knew she had not been touched. “No, I'm...I'll be fine.”

He looked over his shoulder from where the first dredge had come. There, moving amongst the trees, were more lumbering dark shapes. Alette held her breath, eyes darting over the ground. “That's the last we're going to get before winter.” She gestured helplessly at him as he turned back around. “Do we...what do we do?”

Like one of the rabbits in their snares, he looked at her, still and startled, but only for a moment. Suddenly he was on his knees, filling his pockets and arms, eyes on the trees. “Hurry, before more appear.”

“I can see them,” she said, unable to keep all the edge from her voice. “Are you sure?”

“No. We have to try.” He looked back, desperate. “Quickly!”

There was simply too much to carry in their arms to make a difference for Skogr, so Alette righted the cart and went after the yox, which had not made it very far when it escaped. With an arm around the poor beast's muzzle, she stroked its snout, hushing him. The yox's fears forgotten, she was able to lead it back to the cart and reconnect the harness by tying the broken straps together. Where her skin was bare felt feverish, though winter chill was creeping in, sure that the dredge were watching, coming for them. Rook managed to toss most food back in the broken cart, and as soon as the straps were tied, they hurried away, just as the group of dredge entered the creek clearing where one of their own lay dead.

Dredge had only existed in late night campfire stories. Now that the sun no longer set, those stories had no place but in daylight. As they hurried back to Skogr wordlessly, Alette looked about herself, slow and inconspicuous, for fear of catching sight of another dredge. Those they left behind at the creek did not follow, but for the long, painful walk back home she could feel their eyes on her still.

As they approached the town, she felt courage enough to grab her father's hand. There was more there in his palm than could be said in words, and he held it back.

* * *

_What follows is a detailed account of the fall of Skogr—a story you have heard more than once. You read it with grim resignation, learning nothing new beyond the terror of men's hearts, before moving on to the next account._

* * *

 

 


	11. HRAFN, part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the slaughter of Skogr, Rafnsvartr's resolve crumbles.

A silence pressed down upon the caravan from all sides, huge, heavy and still. The sky was cloudless yet grey. Only trees clawed up into it, until Hridvaldyr appeared over the crest of the hill like the sun once had when it still rose and set. He was a looming peak of carved rock, watching with huge eyes that seemed to follow everyone at once, even long after death.

“Wolves tend to lie, you know.”

Rafnsvartr turned to find Tryggvi walking alongside him using his spear as a walking stick, with shifting eyes, wild hair, and a walk like a jittery bug. He had come from the bogs years ago, deep in the south, where the smell alone was enough to scramble your senses. At least, that was among some of the nicer things said about him.

“What?” Rafn said.

“They make you think they’re one place then sneak up on you in another. No matter where you are, there’s always at least one watching, watching, watching.” Tryggvi widened his eyes further and further with each repetition. “Then, when the liars know your weak places, they—” He snapped his jaws next to Rafn’s ear.

Rafnsvartr arched away and sought out Hridvaldyr again. The god of the hunt, thought to roam the lands as a wolf now rather than a man. When he lived, he could change into either at will. For a time, Rafn had tried to pray here, even knowing those prayers would go unanswered, when he tried his hand at hunting. It was years ago that he had last come here to bury a past he never intended to return to. The thought of it opened a hole. The dredge had driven them from their homes onto this road headed west. From one threat into the arms of an old one. Those eyes were big enough to see Rafn to the ends of Midgardr.

“Don't speak such nonsense.”

“This is undiluted wisdom I pass on to you!”

Rafn turned away so he wouldn’t have to see the kragsman. “I don’t want to speak right now.”

“Yet that is what you are doing.”

“We’re grieving. Can’t you see that?”

He heard Tryggvi stop. “It looks like everyone is walking to me,” he said from behind, then ran up to be in stride with Rafn again. “Many of our friends are not walking with us, though. That I see.”

“You have no friends.” As soon as he said it, he winced, turning his head more.

Tryggvi cooed, as if to a child who had just hurt himself. “Oh, little bird. We used to be friends. We would sing such wild, fantastic songs together.” Indeed, Tryggvi had been a friend to Rafnsvartr—in the mead hall, right as the barrels were running dry. “Our minds play with our little puppet strings in different ways, making us do our dances for each other. This is mine—” He spun around with his spear and alternated his feet slowly. “—what’s yours?”

Rafn was no longer turning away to avoid Tryggvi, but had taken to staring straight ahead, jaw clenched, for fear he would lash out in a much more regrettable way than before.

Eventually Tryggvi saluted, gave a flourishing bow while walking, and skipped ahead, singing, “Tumbling, tumbling, tumbling down.”

They climbed the hill on shreds of will and stopped for the first time since they started, strewn underneath Hridvaldyr’s watch. How they got there was still hard to swallow. It had all happened so fast. Warriors. Mothers. Their children. The chieftain. Rafn could look around now and see who the fallen had been from the tears in others’ eyes. He touched his own cheek. Dry. Where was his sorrow?

Buried beneath a rock on the other side of the godstone.

He walked through the crowd, appearing aimless as to not draw attention. There was still uncertainty in his heart as well, which slowed his feet and sowed doubt. He should let it lie; he buried it here for a reason. But the more sobbing he heard, the harder it was to bar against it. He couldn’t cry, but he wanted to. He needed to hurt further, like they did—perform his own dance of grief.

His eyes landed on the late chieftain’s wife, sitting on a rock and staring out over the valley, skin grey and knuckles white on a fist full of her dress. She was near the edge of the stone, and behind her lay the path he had taken years ago. He walked by her slowly, at first to offer some sort of condolence, but she did not seem to notice him there.

That was what did it. Not being noticed was important.

He continued on by her, nothing left to offer, on the path headed down.

The path eventually narrowed off between the godstone and the trees next to it. In the dense underbrush was a particular boulder, sharp at its peak but smooth and rounded down its back, like a small replica of the god next to it. Rafn got to his knees and crawled under the foliage there. A ways in he found the flat, featureless stone of his nightmares.

He moved the rock aside and clawed away frozen chunks of dirt. Soon he scraped his nails against the leather bladder. The touch alone gave him pause, made him feel the ache and the fear. Carefully, he unearthed the last flask of mead he had ever sipped. Stooped among the dead leaves and scattered snow, he clutched it to his chest, a greedy creature sneaking away to do ill. Should he drink it now? He looked upon it and shuddered, his shaking too severe to make the thought come true. How far he had come, in distance and in progress. It would only take a moment to undo all of it. He used to be a hideous mess when he drank.

It had been Mjothvitnir who stopped with him.

He returned to the main caravan.

“It feels like an end,” Rook, Skogr’s huntmaster, said to a family huddled together on the ground. “But for your children—for the village—this cannot be an end. We _endure_. That's what it means to be of Sten's blood. We must go on.”

Rafn stood and listened, hand resting protectively over top his pocket where the skin waited.

* * *

Half a day later, the crying had stopped, but it was replaced by an endless, mindless shuffle of wandering feet, no home and nowhere to go. Rafn watched the heels of the people in front of him, unaware of how far they had come. With each step the mead in his pocket grew heavier.

An opening in the crowd split to the right, where the trees stood so close to one another that the sun could not touch the forest floor. Without hesitation he cut away from the main horde and squeezed through the trees, out of sight, out of mind. He continued to walk alongside the group, but had slowed to withdraw his bane.

His hands trembled as he fumbled with the cap, like a young man touching someone else for the first time. When he brought the flask to his nose, he nearly cried. Honey, ethelberry, summer spice, and that sweet, unforgettable burn. Memories from years gone came back to him softly, strolling up alongside him, always having been just a few paces behind. Endless nights of mead halls, filled with singing men; winter feasts with smoked meats drowned in sweet Tistelberry sauce, and the small mincemeat tarts the chieftain ordered from Gardr; the worn leather handle of his hunting knife, that which he had hardly ever used hunting, but had more often brought it out as a conversation piece when drunk. When was the last time he’d smelled these memories? He would have had any other person believe he hadn’t even thought of mead these past four years. It was only a year ago that he was able to get it out of the house and stop stealing away to stare at it, and even then it hadn’t gone far.

It was here, now.

He turned his back to people who could not see him through the trees and took a long, desperate draught. The mead was sweet sorrow all the way down. It was the guilt that burned so badly his eyes watered. A pitiful whimper passed his lips and he greedily took more.

He had started finding his way back to them after the second sip, and by the time he broke through the trees again, the bladder was empty. He trudged alongside orphans and widowers for a time, shame shining through his eyes as the drink started to blur his world, a fraying tapestry, looking to have been sewn by a child.

The caravan stopped for a rest, and when it did, he found himself at the supply, trading what he had left on his person for more drink. He had an abundance of practice controlling how his eyes looked, how his tongue slithered behind his teeth, how he gestured and moved like he was as dry as Nordfelling Lake. It was like falling into an old groove, carved by years of abuse. How easy it had been to slip back into it, smooth and quick after years of trying to crawl out.

“Do you need water as well?” Rangvald asked, handing over a flask.

“Yes, please,” Rafnsvartr replied, with no intention of drinking it. Appearances had to be kept, after all. Not accepting the water would tip them off.

Another half hour and Rafn had had his third helping of mead, the last one fermented with a particularly robust river yeast. Drool was dripping down his front, and more than once he had found himself face-first in the snow, the memory of falling having never taken root.

He had been walking past tents he could not remember being pitched when Mjothvitnir suddenly had him up in the air, feet dangling. Mjoth’s face was beet-red with anger and from splashed mead Rafn could not recall spilling, yelling hard enough to deafen the gods.

“Bjorulf’s faen ball sac!”

This was unheard of—an angry Mjoth. After that day’s events, though, anything could have happened. “Mjofnir. Pudmedow.”

His eyes rolled and came back together, and Mjothvitnir’s face changed. No. It had never been Mjothvitnir. Valdmar. A man close enough in likeness and strength to trick Rafnsvartr into believing the past day had not happened. What human would do such a thing to another? Valdmar had done it on purpose, of that, Rafn was certain. He aimed for Val’s ear but the blow struck his shoulder, and by the forearm. Val bodily hurled him into others. Then there were three more men, and all of them were in a tousle so deranged, Rafn hit himself more than once.

Somehow he ended up in someone’s arms, and then he was dumped to the snow. His eyes were trying to point in different directions and his tongue was insistent in speaking a different language.

“What's this?”

“A drunk. Threw mead in my face.”

“Is that Rafnsvartr?”

“The jarl of sobriety himself.”

“How'd he get so drunk? Where are the mead stores? Was no one watching?”

“What do we do with him?”

“Only one thing to do.”

“Enough! This is not your decision to make.”

Once, there was a wounded dog outside his house, gouged by the tusk of a boar, enough that some of its entrails were slipping through its belly. He and Mjothvitnir had thought to sew it up, but the dog would snap and bolt up every time they touched it. It panted hard, tongue lolling, and with each heave, a bit more of its blood and insides would slip through. Mjothvitnir brought a rock down on its head after an hour of deliberation.

How long would it take now?

“Rafnsvartr!”

His head snapped up before he knew to look, the dog still fresh in his mind. Rook was bent in front of him, eye-level.

“You’re the leader now, huh? Listen, Mj—Val attacked me. It wasn’...”

But this fell on deaf ears, for he had been slobbering on himself rather than speaking the words he had heard in his head. Something thin and hard was wrapped around his chest, and only once the knot was tied did Rafn realize he’d been tethered to one of the yox cart wheels.

“The rope stays on until you’re sober,” Rook said into his ear. It was warm wind against his cheek, like the breath of someone who cared, whispering words of encouragement that echoed down the gaping crevasse torn open by Mjothvitnir. Then even the breath was gone, the snow crunching under Rook’s departing feet.

Someone’s leftovers splashed against Rafn’s face and slipped down over his fur jacket when he started to recall what had happened not a day previous.

He had sobered a couple of hours later, but had been crying and bumbling so much that the others threw him in the back of the cart and kept him tied for a few hours more. All the while, the sun never moved in the sky. It was the same moment, over and over again, and it would never pass. It would never pass.


	12. HRAFN, part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rafn delves into his past.

When he woke, it was not in his own bed. This one was much harder, stuffed with enough straw (or rocks, for all he knew) to make it as hard as the earth. The furs were dark brown, not black. There was a smell of smoke, jerky, and stale sweat.

He rolled over to see Mjothvitnir slumbering on his back, braided red beard arranged neatly down his neck, as if he’d placed it that way before sleeping. He took in slow, deep breaths, exhales condensing in the air like smoke from a fire, the hair on his chest the flames.

Rafn then realized his own chest was bare. As was the rest of him.

He rose and stopped, sinking back down again. A small man was hitting the inside of his skull with a war axe. When he swallowed it was over a sandpaper tongue, the taste of last night’s mead still lingering there. Shards of the night before were all he had; the picture remained fragmented, particularly the part of ending up in Mjothvitnir’s bed. Not knowing made his insides churn. The thought of what might have happened was roiling up from his gut—

He was flying across the room to lean out one of the windows, spewing all that he had left in him into the snow. It caught in his windpipe and he was coughing and vomiting hard enough that he could hardly catch a breath. Once he purged all that there was to purge, he sank to the floor and leaned against the wall, rubbing his throat while groaning.

Mjothvitnir’s large hand closed down on Rafn’s shoulder. He startled and turned to find Mjoth standing above him, as naked as he was, a look of concern in his eyes.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

Rafn wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand and avoided looking at him. “Too much to drink.”

Mjothvitnir laughed. There was no joy in it. It was not to tease or mock. It was the sound of sympathy, something Rafn was seldom given. “I know how you feel.”

Rafn shied away from Mjothvitnir’s touch, cowering against the wall as if to slip through it and retreat home. What a sight that would be—a naked, skinny man dashing through Skogr: the barefoot spectacle. It wouldn’t be the first time he was the most foolish man around. His purpose was to serve; his strength, self-deprecation.

A beat of silence passed between them and Rafn felt something change. “I’ve made you uncomfortable,” Mjothvitnir said.

Rafn shrugged.

Mjothvitnir crossed the room and stepped into his underclothes. “I’m sorry, Rafnsvartr. I did not mean to do that.”

While Mjothvitnir was turned away, Rafn slunk to his clothes, strewn about the house as if discarded with earnest. As he donned them he could again recall when they were removed. There had been a thirst he could not satisfy, no matter how much he drank of Mjothvitnir’s cup.

He had known Mjothvitnir for ten years. They had drank, they had sang, they had sparred. Their conversations had never gone deeper than the thickness of ice over a frozen pond. And Rafn did not lie with men. He’d never even thought of them that way.

As he was tying his boots, the defining moment came back to him.

“Are you sure?” Mjothvitnir had asked.

And Rafn had kissed him.

He had felt the gods being reborn with that kiss.

Rafn straightened and headed for the door. “I’ll see you on the next hunt,” he mumbled. Mjothvitnir made a reply that Rafn left behind.

* * *

“Awake?” someone said.

Rafn winced. Once again his chest split open, and with it, his head between his eyes. He would have groaned, had not a cold, iron vise clamped down on his throat.

“Now you are.”

He cracked his eyes and peered into the sky. The sun was replaced by a huge varl, his golden hair ablaze. Iver was the only one of his kind in Skogr. Rafn did not really know Iver that well; he had kept them all at arm’s length, and being a varl, he had exceptionally long arms. Now when Rafn looked upon Iver's horns, he saw Iver charge with his head lowered, driving a dredge away, over and over again.

“Broke your dry spell.” Iver was walking alongside the cart Rafn was still lying in but avoided actually looking at him while he spoke. “Is that what Mjothvitnir would have wanted?”

That trapped him. Did Iver know Mjothvitnir, really? Did Iver know about the two of them? And what did he know about what Mjothvitnir would have wanted? How would any varl know what it was like to lose someone, when they had no fathers, no brothers nor lovers? Rafn felt all manner of retorts grip him. He said none of them. None of those things would have been what Mjothvitnir would have wanted him to say and feel. Rafnsvartr wanted nothing more than to be what Mjothvitnir wanted.

“I don’t understand why you got that drunk. I’ve seen humans do more stupid things when they hurt. But I know enough to say that doing this...it will make you hurt even deeper, and those scars never fade, but grow uglier with time.”

Rafn could already feel what Iver spoke of. A pain beyond an ache. A labyrinth so deep and dark the halls swallowed him whole and kept him lost. A weight tied to his lungs, dragging him deeper into the Vast.

“Keep this up and the next time we tie you up, it will be to a rock we leave behind. Don’t let it come to that.”

Iver loosened the knot behind Rafn’s back as he walked alongside the cart. Even though the tie had always been loose enough for him to slip through, he had kept it on in honour of his guilt. The varl walked away, and the sun was unveiled, shining bright, too bright. Rafn curled into a pathetic ball, face buried in the crook of his arm to hide.

* * *

Rafn had not seen another person for a day now. Here his only company was the trees, each of them endlessly tall. In the beginning of the hunt, the silence was a welcome friend, a refuge he had sought out before. Silence—solitude—meant not having to face the childish, regrettable things he had done while there had been more drink than blood in him. After the first hour, however, the silence only gave him room to scream, trapped inside his own head where Mjothvitnir was living.

It had been a year ago when Rafn joined the hunters. He was showing Rook and other hunters how well he could aim by firing at a stuffed straw man across the yard. Well, aiming at. By the fourth miss, most of the men in the yard were bent double, laughing so hard they could scarcely breathe. Except for Rook, who looked tired and put-upon. And Mjoth. He was not scowling, not smiling either, but nodded when they made eye contact, soft and solemn.

Then there were the stories. Rafnsvartr thought on all the stories he had heard from Mjothvitnir. At least, all those he could still remember, when he had not yet been terribly drunk. At first he quickly listed them, then slowed to cover their details. All of them were of strengths, achievements, fortune gained. After he spent half a day retelling those stories to himself, he had not come across one scathing remark, no slight against anyone’s name. It was all gentle. A calming light to bask in. Mjothvitnir was the last tree in the world and Rafn was a wandering raven, grateful for a place to finally rest his tired wings.

Rafn winced and leaned against a nearby tree, kicking it in lieu of himself. Thinking of Mjothvitnir that way felt warm, and that warmth he needed to flee from, as if it radiated from a pile of dung and not the sun. What if others found out? He had no idea what might happen to him now. Men simply did not... _mingle_ with men in Skogr. Or anywhere he’d ever been, for that matter. It wasn’t right. Was it?

“Why now?” he muttered under his breath, beating the butt on his fist on the bark. Women. Oh, but did he love women. And a few of them loved Rafn. Or, at least, a couple may have, a long time ago. Now men. Man. Just Mjothvitnir.

When they all set out on the hunt together, a score of men, Rafn walked on the other side of the troupe from Mjothvitnir, silently listening to Gunn’s words about the different kinds of bee and how they could be used to finally bring farming and mead-making to Skogr. Rafn nodded at appropriate intervals, and the rest of the time he tried not to relive The Night over and over, for every time a flash of it took him over, he felt a surge that threatened to harden where he preferred to remain limber.

A crunch took him away from all that, thankfully.

Very carefully, Rafnsvartr lowered his arm and readied an arrow, turning slowly, feet planted as to not make more noise. An elk grazed not thirty paces behind him, angled just so as to not see him standing there. How did it get there without him noticing?

_It’s moments like these that remind you you should have stuck with being a faen mercenary and not tried your hand at faen hunting you faen drunkard._

He turned one foot around, then the other, each time making so little noise he scarcely heard himself move. He lined up his shot and waited for the right angle. The elk took its time clearing the forest floor of what little grass it could find. Finally it turned just so as to expose its neck.

Rafn pulled and loosed.

The elk jolted and ran, the arrow planted deep. Its path was traced by a dashed red line as it retreated farther into the woods. Rafn slung his bow over his shoulder and followed.

Not long after, he found the elk lying down a slight slope on brambles, its legs crossed as if still in mid-gallop. He stood examining it, running a hand through his hair. Golden fur, straight and smooth, a soft blanket over tense sinew clenched in death throes. Blood was everywhere.

When he started to hear the footsteps, he acted as if he couldn’t hear them. At the point it became obvious he had, he knelt down by the elk with his dagger and pretended to know what to do next. He’d always been with someone else when it was time to dismember game, and they always gave directions. Directions which were different every time.

The footsteps came to a stop beside him. He did not look. He did not have to to know who it was.

“A very good shot.”

To hear his voice made everything which Rafn had spent the day trying to bury burst to the surface. He adjusted his grip on his knife and stared at the elk, prompting it to weigh in on the conversation on his behalf.

Mjothvitnir waited patiently for quite a while before he knelt by the hindquarters and began to slice away skin from muscle, joint from bone. Rafn watched from the corner of his eye and began to do the same on the front leg. This was Mjothvitnir’s way of protecting his pride, he knew. The past few years working alongside him had shown Rafn that Mjoth had a wisdom seldom given to humans from the gods.

In the blink of an eye Mjothvitnir had the elk’s leg in his arms and slung it over his shoulder. He began removing the backstrap, gliding his blade along the spine. Rafn fell in step to help him, coiling the meat around his arms as it was delivered. A rhythm developed and they worked fluidly together, helping one another accomplish the other’s task. By the time the elk was dismembered and prepared, something settled within Rafn.

They collected all they could carry and stood by the carcass, neither looking at the other or the elk.

“I’m so sorry, Rafnsvartr.”

The trees were so thin, yet so tall. Rafn looked up and up and up, following them into the sky, wondering how they remained upright like that. “I am too.” He said it over a lump in his throat so large it threatened to bring tears to his stinging eyes.

He heard Mjothvitnir open and close his mouth a few times. “You’ve nothing to be sorry for.”

“I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to do this.” He gestured between the two of them. “I don’t mean the elk. Though…”

“What I did was wrong. You should be ready. You should want to do this.”

“I d—I do. I do.” Rafn swallowed. His nose was burning so he looked to the roots and pinched his bridge. Admitting it out loud was like leaping off a fjord into the sea below, with everyone in the village standing by to watch. It was just Mjothvitnir, but the weight of it was still pushing against his lungs. He took in a long, thin breath and held it. “I don’t know if I can.”

Mjothvitnir sighed. A sad sound. “I did not mean to do this to you.”

Rafn lowered his hand but kept his eyes closed. “I wanted it. I want. I want...to be around you.”

Without seeing anything, he could feel the warmth of a smile on him. “Let’s start there, then.”

Rafn shifted the weight of the meat on his shoulder and turned, managing a small smile to Mjothvitnir’s feet. Rafn started on the path back to camp, and Mjoth followed.


	13. HRAFN, part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rafn makes a grave trade.

With the sun ever at high noon and the land an endless, white wasteland, Rafn could not tell how long it had been since he washed away his four years with that skin of mead. Though it was likely not even a day, it felt like weeks, and the need was making his tongue ache for the taste of it.

Gardr was a village found halfway between Skogr and Frostvellr where the people there somehow found a way to till the land. Crops grew with very little yield, but domestic animals were of no shortage. The pigs and goats grew fat here (compared to the lean game served in Skogr), and they were easier to swallow. Rafn had had that meat a few times, when he and Mjothvitnir had traded enough pelts in a moon to afford a quarter. It was a sweet indulgence that tasted of undeserved reward.

The caravan rolled into the village, filling the holes and the cracks with their belongings and their shock. Rafn found Iver and Rook telling a group of people what had brought them here. While the others started to set up tents, farmers approached families to offer them room and board for a night. That brought on the tears afresh. Rafn sat alone on a rock and watched everyone cry together.

He could already feel the promise of sharp pains in his arms and legs. Later they would snake towards his stomach and make it cramp, begging for more to drink. If he did not deliver, the pain would crawl further and further and burn, bright and hot, until everything was aflame, and nothing remained.

When he began bouncing his leg to try and distract himself from the discomfort, he felt his hunting knife flop against his thigh. He had forgotten he had it on him. Rafn took it from its sheath to look at it. Rust was collecting at the base near the handle. He ran his thumb across the blade; he would have had greater risk cutting himself on a wooden spoon. The leather was discoloured, the engravings were fading, the past was disappearing and Rafn would not even be able to cut himself to disappear with it.

He stood abruptly, heading for the footpath. Near the top of the incline he had seen a trade market. Stalls were flooded with people, one lonely merchant against an army of the displaced, giving away all they had left for a chance at a few more days. His fingernails were pulsing. He saw a woman holding a swaddled baby, both crying, sidestepping this way and that to find a way around the crowd and closer to the front of the line. Rafn saw a gap closer to where he stood. The mother did not seem to. The choice was easy; the pain was not.

“‘N you?” the merchant said as Rafn stole the spot. The colour was drained from the merchant’s face, the lines on his forehead etched deep.

“Mead,” was all Rafn said. The look the man gave him next was as clear as being handed a mirror. Rafn put down the dulled knife, fingers lingering on the handle for just a moment. The air was much colder on his skin when he pulled away.

The merchant looked at the blade. His nostrils flared like he smelled something sour. His sharp, lightless eyes raked over Rafn’s. “I’ve got no mead left.”

“Please,” Rafn muttered, then dug inside his coat for anything, anything else. _Please let there be something._ He withdrew a handful of nuts, a patch of rabbit fur, a dried and pressed flower, and a piece of string. He placed them around the knife lovingly, all the while the others around him fell into a silence so disapproving that Rafn was beginning to entertain a shred of doubt.

But the merchant huffed and turned away. “I may have half a skin left from my personal things.” Rafn put the others from his mind. May they all drown in the faen Vast. He was going to receive his blessing after all.

The merchant handed him the skin. “Don’t drink it all in one place,” he said, but Rafn had already turned away, looking for a place to drink away from constant watch.

He sat behind a tent and finished the mead within minutes. The burning faded away...but it was not numbness that took its place. He rubbed the tips of his tingling fingers together, then brought them to his nose, to see if he could still smell the leather. But he had splashed mead on them during his first hasty sip. It was gone.

“Oh.” Rafn ran his hands through his hair, then raked his crown, then his face, scratching his skin to make it hurt, to distract himself from what he’d done. He crawled to his own haphazardly set tent and lay on top of the furs, clutching them to his face so that no one would hear him cry.

* * *

“What do the engravings mean?” Rafn asked, running his thumb along the leather handle.

Mjoth finished his tankard and put it aside, sliding a bit closer to Rafn on the bench. At first he felt like he should pull away, but he had had just enough mead to push him a few inches closer, so that their knees touched. Mjoth took the knife from him and began to run one large finger along one of the lines.

“I don’t remember what each line represents. It was a long time ago, and I was a little drunk at the time when I got it. But this line here? It represents longevity. The path of someone’s life. The rest of it is what we face along the way. Do you see?”

He handed it back to Rafn, who took it and traced his finger down the same line. It was smooth for a time, then had to wind tightly in and through other lines, then cut abruptly at an angle near the base of the handle. He could see his own reflection in the blade, one blue eye staring back at him.

“Who gave this to you?”

“A good friend of mine. He received it from a mender on a job as pay. He’d forgotten half the engravings too by the time he told me what they were. I suspect he made most of it up.” Mjoth spoke softly, a tender smile on his face, until he frowned, eyes far-off. “He died. He tried to leave mercenary work behind, but it wouldn’t leave him.”

Rafn put the knife down between them. “I tried my hand at mercenary work for a while.”

Mjoth raised his eyebrows, the corners of his mouth arching. “Did you?” He reached for the flagon in front of him and refilled both their tankards.

“It was years ago. Thought I would prove to my father that all those lessons with Iver amounted to something.” He took a long drink. _That_ I _amounted to something._

“It wasn’t for you?”

“No. I was useless out there. Didn’t work well with the others.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t say much when others talked, didn’t know what to do to help out. Someone was always directing me, watching out for me, or doing my job for me. Everyone complained about me behind my back, I knew, but no one was asking me to leave. That’s what I couldn’t stand. Then I thought...Skogr could always use more hunters, right? Maybe some of my skills could be better there.

“Most of the time I’m by myself when I hunt. I’m horrid when it comes to tracking, worse when it comes to field dressing, but there’s no one around to let down. It’s just me, and I’m used to it. Being alone makes me more comfortable. And the forest...you spend your life thinking it’s so quiet, but when you’re out there by yourself, everything just comes alive around you, like it doesn’t even know you’re listening.”

He rarely spoke so much at once, and now that he had stopped, he felt exposed, and somehow idiotic. Rafn brushed the handle with the side of his hand. Just his mouth was visible in the reflection on the blade this time—thin and down-turned, for everything he said gave him an unpleasant taste in his mouth.

Mjoth put a hand on his shoulder. A big, strong hand, tender and careful. “When I came here ten years ago, I met some of the quietest people I had ever known. Skogr is not a place one finds much merriment and frivolity, but even some of the loudest here barely made a sound, like you were always hunting and didn’t want to scare the animals away.” He withdrew his hand to take another drink from his tankard. “Solemness is something that cannot be avoided this far north, I know. But your silence doesn’t seem to come from that, Rafn. You choose to see rather than to show. Hear rather than be heard. You have an appreciation for the life around you. Now...I can tell you for the rest of our lives that you are intelligent, strong, and admirable, but I know that won’t convince you. You are the only person who can convince you of that.” His other hand closed down on top of the knife and he slid it towards Rafn. “I want you to keep it.”

This time, he saw his whole face in the blade. He looked up to Mjoth. His eyes were blue too, but so much deeper. It felt like looking into the sun to look into his eyes too long. “Why?”

“To remind you of how intricate life is, and how easily the rest of us lose sight of it.”

Rafn smiled too and took the knife, their hands brushing briefly as Mjoth withdrew. To be able to touch him and not feel so wrong...

He reached for his tankard. “I’ll drink to that.” They clanked mugs and drank deep.


	14. HRAFN, part 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two people make a decision that changes the fate of a village.

Two men in red were walking alongside the departing caravan that were identical down to their braids, save for the long scar running from brow to chin on one of them. The twins strolled past all the families who watched them go with a stunned sort of captivation. An angry mob was coming up behind them from Gardr, not a hundred paces away. They made directly for the yox cart holding Skogr’s banner, where Iver and Rook stood, waiting. The caravan was slowing to a halt behind them.

Rafn was far enough away that he couldn’t hear what was being discussed. Their conversation was short, interrupted by a tall, lanky bearded man with a terribly broken nose and a split lip.

“Shut your mouth, Hogun!” His yell echoed twice. He continued in a less harsh tone, still audible from where Rafn stood. “These bastards don’t speak for us. They’ve been trying to divide the village since you got here.”

Rafn wandered around bystanders, wending his way closer. It felt as if lightning were about to strike.

“I’ll have you both gutted before I let half the village desert!” the angry one belted, to a statement unheard. The rest of the mob had closed the distance, only half of them as red-faced as their representative. “You both know what will happen to the rest of us if the fields are abandoned! Nobody leaves!” He punctuated the last two words by punching the air.

There was a fair number of armed men and women that far outnumbered the twins and even Rook’s immediate company, but the two brothers looked almost as if they watched a puppet show put on by simpletons. As Rafn slowly moved forward, people were slowly stepping back, taking their children in arms and holding one another’s hands.

“Nothing will be left to tend once the dredge arrive,” Rook said, voice deep and soft.

Broken Nose made a rude sound to counter it. “Dredge, my ass!” he said to Rook, then turned on Hogun. “I don’t know what the scam is this time, Hogun, but you got two choices.” He held up one crooked finger, knuckles pointed towards Hogun. “Get back to work”—he lifted the second finger, making a vulgar gesture—“or I’m finally putting you in the ground.”

Hogun drummed his fingers on his shield leisurely. The hint of a sneer showing through his beard. He turned to his brother with the face scar. “Mogun, what do you think? Thought it was unfair that he only asked me.”

Mogun said nothing, and his eyes did not leave Broken Nose as he slowly drew his axe. Hogun followed suit, as well as the armed townsfolk behind their leader. Rafn reached for the dull dagger that was no longer there and felt his body throb all over.

“I think I make a poor farmer,” Mogun said.

Rook looked caught between a bear and a mountain lion. He shifted on his feet but did not move, looking between the two parties to keep his eyes on both. A coldness set on his face. “Iver,” was all he said.

He drew his axe and Iver stepped forward. Those that had not looked passionate about backing their leader seemed to shrink where they stood. Broken Nose pointed in Hogun’s face and looked over his shoulder. “Cut these motherless—”

Mogun brought his shield down on Broken Nose’s arm. When he screamed and clutched at his broken wrist, bent in half, Mogun drove his axe down on that bald pate over and over and over until he was beating into a red pulp.

Iver banged against his shield with his sword and hollered, long and loud. Immediately two of the townspeople turned tail and fled, while the others instinctively raised their shields, or ducked behind those that did. Hogun and Rook worked side by side, taking on one farmer at a time like carefully working loose a firm knot. Others joined the skirmish and Rook’s daughter ran for the trees, as well as one of the farmers.

Rafn watched them go. The girl did not see the man. The farmer could see nothing else.

Rafn sprinted, fast as wind, to the man chasing down the girl. It was a bizarre feeling, moving that fast. He was not aware of moving his legs, or taking air into his lungs, or really even looking with his eyes.

Rafnsvartr drove his shoulder into the farmer's back. He pitched forward into a tree with an ugly _thunk_. A smear of blood covered the bark and the snow. A single tooth lay at the foot of the tree.

The man got to his feet, screaming in pain. He was tall and gaunt, but his black beard was full and long, making him look much bigger than Rafn. There was a wild hate in his eyes as he lunged. Rafn slithered this way and that like a snake. His attacker swung wildly, as hard and fast as he could, without any control.

These people had no experience in a fight. Here they harvested a meagre field and raised fat swine, and had desperation for life, but did not know how to hold onto it.

The man threw his own balance when he tried to reach for Rafnsvartr, and Rafnsvartr used that momentum to drive him head-first into another tree trunk. There was another crunch. This time the farmer fell face-first into the snow, one leg flailing while he soiled himself.

Rafn stood over the body, once again very aware of the tremble in his legs from running so hard, the sharp ache in his arms from having thrown the man with more force than he should have been capable of, the vibrations rolling up and down his skin, standing each of his hairs on end.

He looked but could not see a trace of the girl. The sounds of battle had died down in the field, but he could not see them from where he was. Then he looked back at the body. The smell of shit quickly became overpowering.

He limped back to the caravan to find the twins standing next to Rook, blood-spattered. Two of the three of them were grinning. The bodies lay all the way down the path that led back to their home, unarmed villagers standing amongst them.

“Let’s keep moving,” Iver said with a booming voice, making those near him jolt. He grabbed the reins of the yox and encouraged it forward.

Rafn fell in step on numb feet with the stragglers immediately behind the cart, arms and legs burning.

* * *

“Do you see that?”

Rafn jumped a little. How he had fallen asleep outside with the sun never setting and the air getting crisper, he wasn’t quite sure. He did not open his eyes but stretched and took in a deep breath. “Hm?”

“Up the hill.”

He cracked his bleary eyes to peer up the path. A fuzzy wash of trees and snow was all he could see. “What is it?” he mumbled.

“Rafn. Get up.”

He opened his eyes and looked at Mjoth. He was on his feet, muscles clenched, ready to run. Rafn stood with him. “What?” He looked again.

Tall, dark black giants were standing amongst the trees, yellow eyes glowing.

“What is…” He already knew what they were. The stories were not that old. But the stories had said they were all gone. There was a scream from not far off.

“Come.” Mjoth went back inside and Rafn followed. He had a sack out and was tossing preserves from the floor cellar into it frantically. Rafn retrieved another sack and began filling it with skins, clothes, salves, arrows, whetstones, anything he could fit in the bag and still carry.

“Take these,” Mjoth said, handing over the bag of food. He slung a bow over his shoulder and drew his axe, moving towards the door. “Let’s get to the hall.”

Rafn’s tongue felt thick, doused with an oil to numb it, and it travelled down his throat, spread through his chest. “Are they dredge?” he managed to say, standing dumbstruck where Mjoth had left him.

Panic lit up in Mjoth’s eyes. “We need to leave! Come!” He tore the door open and charged out.

Rafn rushed to the door. From where he stood, it was only about five steps. A small distance, in all respects. He had a hovel compared to Mjoth’s feasting hall of a hut, but Mjoth had used to say he felt more at home under Rafn’s roof. “All that I never need is here,” he would say, over and over again, with a kind smile for Rafn.

It was this moment that would play out over and over again, when he was sober, piss drunk, or dreaming, until the end of his days. Mjoth at the door, fear coiling around his words. Then his absence, those five steps from the middle of the room to the door, the middle of the room to the door, the middle of the room to the doorway where he could see a black stone sentinel towering over Mjoth’s body, the head smashed in by the bloody mace the giant held. Those eyes that seemed to glow burned into Rafn, and before it could think to advance on him, Iver was there, horns lowered, driving the dredge away from Mjoth.

“The Great Hall!” Iver shouted without looking back at Rafn. “Go!”

And Rafn ran. Without looking back or even able to really understand why, he left Iver and Mjoth behind.

The middle of the room to the door. Five steps encompassed every conversation they had ever shared after The Night, the year it took for Rafn to fall back into Mjoth’s bed willingly, the long struggle to end Rafn’s need of mead. Five steps included every look, touch, kiss, hunting trip, chore, hardship, every second of every day for five long, wonderful years, where Rafn had felt he was finally alive, that colour had beauty to it, and there was good in the world worth living for.

Mjoth’s body was likely trampled by thousands of dredge now. Rafnsvartr did not even have the chance to hold Mjoth one last time. Five steps, a dead Mjoth, then a desperate run for the hall. That was their goodbye, his funeral. Sometimes Rafn would catch himself fantasizing different details to those five steps. The one he fixated on most was the one where Mjoth carried all the food, because it was much heavier and Rafn was not as strong, then Rafn pulled the hunting blade (which he had sharpened regularly rather than let fall to disuse) and charged out the door ahead of Mjoth, and five steps later his head was smashed in instead.

But he could not change it. The truth would play out again, in the end. The same moment, over and over again, and it was always going to stay like that.


	15. HRAFN, part 6

The good thing that had come of all the stragglers of Gardr joining them was their abundance of ale and mead; they had even more of it than they had water, and they were more than willing to trade these things for baubles. Or, in Rafn’s case, for begging.

He was weaving up and down the rows of tents, humming a tune to himself his father used to sing when _he_ would get stumbling drunk, thinking about the farmer he had killed earlier that day. Or had it been two days ago? The look on his face must have been very much like Rafn’s. Neither knew the reason why they ran to the forest, or why they were facing one another at that moment. When he thought on it long enough he realized he couldn't quite recall any moment of his life that was unlike that fight. Rafn's entire existence was awkward, fumbling happenstance.

Rafn upended his mug, still staggering this way and that, and tripped over a tent rope, but caught himself in time before he uprooted it. He laughed to think what he would have found inside the tent, had he brought down the canvas. People were both alive and dead when they were behind an opaque veil. Sleeping, drinking, shitting, rutting, dying, fighting—all of it happened at once. The thought made Rafn keel. A cramp in his side twisted double but he could not stop laughing, despite the pain. At least, he thought he felt pain. He knew he should be feeling it. Perhaps he was just putting the pain there because he knew it was what he ought to do.

When he carried on, he fell over a second time. Snow filled his mouth. Though he coughed on it, some melted on his tongue and he swallowed it. The cold was a balm he needed more of. Certain that no one was around, he started to fill his mouth with the stuff. A welcome chill spread through his chest, his gut, all the way down his sinewy legs, where the feeling grew so cold it burned.

A laugh cut off his snow-eating frenzy. At least, at first he thought it was a laugh, but when he looked about he saw a woman screaming for help, waving her arms wildly at the fire that was blazing behind him on the supply cart, a tent, and spreading up his pant leg.

“Oh.” He took handfuls of snow and tossed them on his leg, but it did nothing to abate the flame. “Oh! OH!”

“Roll around, you faen idiot!” someone screamed.

Rafn tried rolling in two different directions at once. Without meaning to he pissed his pants, and for a moment he thought that might help put out the fire, but it did no such thing but spread a warmth inside his thighs as he felt the skin on his legs start to bubble.

He produced a squawking shriek until someone came along and rolled him over. Then there were so many hands beating on him, and he curled into a ball to try to protect himself from the onslaught. They were hurting him for what he’d done. Being a drunk.

“Do it,” he shouted, throat closing and eyes burning like his leg. That is when the beating stopped, however, and those same hands now dragged him to his feet, even though the fire grew more intense on him. He put up a fight with the intent that they would be convinced to throw him back down and keep beating him until he could no longer feel flame nor fist.

Soon they did throw him to the ground on a patch free of snow. The impact made him clack his jaw, teeth slicing through a bit of his tongue. It was the sharp needle in his lungs he felt when he could not take a breath, the bitter iron of blood in his mouth he tasted, but the pain on his tongue was as quiet as a mouse compared to the chorus of screams his burning leg produced. When he writhed to look at it, he saw no more flames but could feel them growing hotter still.

“Is the fire put out?” Rook said. Rafn twisted back around to see his leader standing there. Bags were under his eyes, and his hair stuck out this way and that.

“It got some of the cured meats, but yes, the fire is out,” Val said. He had been the one to drag Rafn all the way from the flames, he who dared look so much like Mjoth.

“My leg,” Rafn wheezed on breathless lungs. He was crying freely, wincing so hard his cheeks were cramping. Blood began to drip from the corner of his mouth.

“You faen child,” Oddleif said from behind. She marched up to him, yanked him to his feet, and planted her fist hard and fast into his rib. He yelled, short and sharp, and clutched his chest.

“No. Back away from him.” Rook was standing right before Rafn, a wolf protecting his cub. A different sort of pain slowly descended on him now. Rook was looking at just him, but speaking so all nearby could hear. “You'll rest and drink away from others until you learn to control yourself.” Then he turned to everyone else. “This man trades with no one but me. He camps on the outskirts for now.”

“Kill me,” Rafn whispered, so that only Rook could hear. But he did not. Old friends (no, people he would go on hunts with), Gunn and Orm, were there on either side of him suddenly, holding each of his arms and marching him off. Neither man would look at him. The last time he had seen them both, they did not have grey or silver in his beard, nor so many cracks around his eyes.

“Where are you taking me?” Rafn asked Orm. Orm stared straight ahead, mouth tightly shut.

“Gunn?”

“Leave it, Rafnsvartr.” Gunn barely gave him a sidelong glance.

Rafn thought quickly, and dove in without thinking any more. “I dropped my drink somewhere amongst the tents. Could we go back for it? Have any of you got any?”

Silence.

“Please, I need it. My leg, it's still on fire. I can't stand the pain. Give me something for the pain.”

Orm turned his head towards Rafn but Gunn spoke first. “Did you not hear Rook at all?”

“At least cut my leg off. It hurts so badly.”

“We cut your leg off, you'll never outrun the dredge again,” Orm said, looking at him with large, heated eyes.

“I don't care. Do it. Help me. Please.”

Orm's grip loosened for a second and he reached for his hip.

“Stop!” Gunn reached across Rafn and grabbed Orm's hand. “He's not worth it.”

When Orm let go of Rafn, Rafn had sunk a foot lower to the ground. Orm glared down into Rafn's face, and for all the sunlight around them, his face was so dark. “You hear that? You're not worth it.” He looked up at Gunn. “I'll not carry him anymore. Leave him here.”

Rafn was dumped in the snow where he stood. He cried out sharply when his burned leg hit the ground. “We'll be back with a tent for you,” Gunn said by way of apology as he turned his back.

Smoke still rose into the pale sky from the supply cart Rafn had inadvertently set fire to. He swallowed a mouthful of blood and watched it coil higher, higher, and higher until he was staring straight into the sun. He closed his eyes, the light piercing his lids, red as the blood in his mouth.

* * *

He woke learning against a tree with such a pain in his leg to make him scream. He opened his eyes to see a girl kneeling by his leg, spreading a salve over the burn. He gripped the tree trunk behind him as she slid back, crouched in the snow. Rook's daughter.

“I just came to treat your burn,” she said after a long silence.

Sobriety was a heavy weight growing only heavier. With each heartbeat, his head pulsed harder. He winced, collected what little he could collect, and said, “Why?”

She sat, unblinking, worrying at one of her thumbs. After a while she slowly approached his leg again, and kept the question unanswered for them both.

For all her kindness the salve burned when she spread more on his leg. He wanted to squirm but kept still for her. The wound was merely an angry red welt from ankle to knee. He was lucky it was not worse, though it felt it.

As she did her work, he saw her run into the trees, again and again, the crazed farmer chasing after her, unbeknownst to her. Rafn kept feeling the weight of that farmer under his hands as he tossed him into a tree. That crunch. The smell. Over and over again. He stared at her face, veiled by her fiery hair, and thought what might have happened had he not seen, had he not been sober.

When she was done, she wrapped it in a thin linen and tied it closed, then gently rolled his half-burned pant leg down again. Rafn watched her stand, rub her hands on her green cloak, and pick up the small bowl of salve she had left over.

“Don't touch it for a day,” she said softly to the bowl. “I'll change it when we next stop to camp.” She turned and walked a few paces, then stopped. She looked at her feet and shuffled them, but did not turn back around.

“Thank you,” Rafn muttered, mostly to break the silence. It felt shameful to say it.

“Please take care of yourself,” she said quietly, then continued on. He watched her disappear amongst a sea of tents, apart from him.

Someone had set up a tent near where he sat, just on the edge of the treeline. The effort to climb into it now was too much. He could not tell what was worse, the burning on his leg or in each of his limbs. The dryness in his throat made it painful to swallow. A headache so severe he could hardly turn his head wracked him to his lower back. The hole he had bit in his tongue felt as if it was tearing itself larger with each beat of his heart. Though the sun bore down upon him mercilessly, he felt as cold as he had during the blizzard years back, when he had nearly froze to death.

Some time passed before his bladder demanded he move. Like he had aged forty winters during his sleep, he got to his feet laboriously. It was too much to bear weight on his burned leg, so he touched his toes to the ground and limped along from one tree to the next, slowly finding his way deeper into the forest where no one would see him.

Not far in there was a sudden valley. The trees were slanted with the land rather than standing straight up. A landslide had happened here, perhaps only a year or two past. Boulders and fallen logs were scattered all across the decline. He limped back from the edge and stood well away from it when he pissed against another tree.

“Ho there. Rafnsvartr?”

Quickly, Rafn tucked himself away and turned round. One of the blond twins from Gardr stood about twenty paces away, the one with the scar across his face. He had a skin in hand.

“You shouldn't be near me,” Rafn said. When he tried to swallow it was with a dry mouth. He winced at the discomfort.

“Ah. All that. I'm just out for a walk. They can't punish me if I just happen to be out walking near where you are.” He took a drink from his skin, and Rafn quickly looked away. “How are you doing, anyway? Harsh punishment for a man who set his own leg on fire. Like you haven't suffered enough already.”

Suffering. Mjoth's smiling face was the first thing Rafn saw when he closed his eyes. Then the body, head caved in. The hunting knife he pawned off for the mead. All the drinks he'd had since Hridvaldyr's ever-watching godstone.

“My name is Mogun. I'm from—”

“Gardr, I know. I saw you lead the fight.”

“Mm. Would have rather not had to do that. I knew most of those people my whole life. But we do what we need to to survive. They were too, I guess.” He sounded as regretful as a hungry stealing bread for his supper. He took another drink and stood by the sharp drop in the valley. “I grew up in these parts, but I've hardly ever explored these woods. Just stuck to the road between here and Frostvellr. Not much a man of the land, you know?” He looked back at Rafn, and handed the skin out.

Rafn shook his head and quickly looked away.

“Right. You're not supposed to.” He took another drink for himself and looked down the decline. “My brother stopped drinking when he had children. We used to be so much alike up until he got married. He said it was one of the hardest things he ever did.”

“Stop drinking?”

“No, getting married. He used to love women just as much as I do.” Given the perfect blond braids, the shapely beard, and high cheekbones so sharp you could whet a sword on them, Rafn was sure women loved the twins even more. “When one of them said she was giving him a tiny prize he decided it was best to leave his past behind and make an honest living with her.” Mogun scoffed and drank again. “That fight back there was the closest we've been in a long while. It was perfect.”

“What?”

“Farming was to me like dancing is for a varl. Fighting, though...I feel alive again.”

Rafn took several short, spaced breaths. “A lot of people have died.”

“Yeah. They have. Shame.” He took one long, heavy drink. “I'm going to make sure a lot of them don't die anymore,” he said darkly.

Rafn looked at Mogun's back cautiously. “Were you ever a mercenary?”

“Hm? No, if you could believe it. Wanted to.”

“Where'd you learn with shield and axe?”

“Dad. He was the mercenary. Wanted a better life for his kids, so he only taught us enough to protect ourselves. Hogun and me taught each other the rest.”

Rafn limped up beside him, keeping two steps between him and the edge of the valley. “I learned from Iver.”

“Oh, the, uh...big one.”

“Yes.”

“Wouldn't want to tangle with him.”

“No, you wouldn't.”

“Glad he was on our side. That _Rook_ was on our side.”

Rafn winced. What if Rook and Iver had chosen to fight against the twins? How many fewer would have died then? Would the farmer Rafn tossed into a tree trunk have lived to join them?

“Heard that the chieftain's widow just handed him the banner. A huntsman. Must be one incredible man to command that sort of gift.”

Rafn nodded. His hands had started to shake so he folded his arms across his chest.

“He was a little rough on you, though, don't you think?”

Rafn swayed on the spot and started to speak three times but failed to say anything.

“Oh. Not the first time it's happened, then?”

He sighed, letting go of as much as he could in one breath. “No.”

“Can't blame you. Man could turn to worse things to deal with all this. Hah, look at me. I'm a little in my skin myself!” Mogun took another drink. He turned his bright blue eyes on Rafn, fixing him with a sly grin that made his scar smile too, and handed the skin over again.

It was much worse this time. The smell swelled up and crashed against his chest, a tidal wave of temptation, and the force of it was enough to drown him. “Please,” Rafn said, closing his eyes and leaning away.

“Trying to break the habit?”

“Yes.”

“I know from experience that dropping it all at once does even worse things for you. You need to wean yourself off something for it to work.”

“I dropped it all at once before.” There he was again: Mjoth, holding Rafn close to his chest while cold sweat and tremors wracked him not two days in to sobriety.

“These are different circumstances now, aren't they? No steady home to go to, no reliable source of fresh water to drink, no fire to keep you warm on the road. Look at you, you're shivering like you're about to keel over. Take a drink to ward away the cold.”

“I can't.” But Rafn was turning towards Mogun, and his eyes were locked to the skin.

“Think of it as a beginning to quitting. You drink this, then don't allow yourself any more until we get to Frostvellr. Then have one more. Take it in steps.” Mogun waved the skin in his face again.

This time the smell snaked up his nose and twisted around his mind, the great serpent Radomyr coiling round and round and squeezing until he would take a drink.

He grabbed the skin from Mogun. It was not fast, nor slow, but determined: a set course he could not stop himself from.

As the mead flowed down his throat, he doused the fire in his arms and legs. _I'm sorry_ , he thought.

“That's it,” Mogun said, laughing. “Drink up.”

Mogun grabbed Rafn's shoulder with both hands and tossed him down the slope.

The first time Rafn's head hit a boulder, he felt it carve out a corner of his skull. By the third and fourth time, he could no longer feel. He was somewhere between dead and alive, where the world was getting smaller and fading away, and he was very aware of the fact that he was dead, when he saw a wolf standing at the top of the slope where Mogun had been.

He'd heard once that your life flashes before your eyes when you die, so that you might make peace with yourself in your final moments, but for Rafn, he thought of the word “mead” and then, for the first time in weeks, it was dark.


	16. HRAFN, part 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A sad memory

“What are you doing?”

Rafn stopped, sweat-covered hand in mid-air, clutching a pair of wool socks. He did not think Mjoth would be home for hours.

Mjoth said nothing, but waited patiently for Rafn to speak. This made him throw his socks back onto the bed forcefully. He turned to Mjoth, body clenched, blood pumping hard.

“Get mad at me.”

“What?” Mjoth said softly.

“Don’t— _do_ that!”

“Rafn, what is it?”

Rafnsvartr tossed his travelling sack on the floor. “Be so...faen caring all the time. Why are you still here with me? Just—raise your voice.”

Mjoth got quieter. “Are you going to leave?”

Rafn kicked Mjoth’s bed. “Faen!”

“What brought this on?”

“The drinking! The drinking, Mjoth! Do you not see me drowning in mead every day? Why do you not get angry with me? I’m disgusting! I need to stop or I need to leave. Mm.” It hit hard. It was something he had been saying to himself for a while but had never given it a voice. He wanted neither of those things to be true. He was nodding and running his hand through his hair. “I need to stop or I need to leave. And I don’t know if I can…”

Mjothvitnir moved into the house and gently put his hands on top of Rafn’s, tangled in his hair as they were. Gently, Mjoth encouraged his hands down, and gave them a firm squeeze. “I didn’t know you felt this way.”

“Everyone else feels that way about me.”

“I didn't think you were among them.”

“No?” Rafn scoffed, but felt himself shrink when he looked up at Mjoth. It became difficult to speak.

“What is it about the drinking that bothers you?”

Rafn stood silently for some time. Mjoth sat on the bed and encouraged Rafn to sit next to him. Minutes passed. Rafn had to provide some sort of answer. Fill the emptiness with some words that ought to have been expected. What were those words, then? What was appropriate? Drinking was common in Skogr. Mead and ale were staples. People drank them in halls or in their homes. Then they went on, not drinking it, fixing weapons and houses, hunting game, creating, accomplishing, excelling. By the time they came back to the mead hall they would find Rafnsvartr there, head on the table, like he'd never even left.

“I've let my life waste away.”

“Why do you feel that way?”

“I can't do anything. You have skills, you have friends, you're strong and you're respected. You spent time on those things and I spent time at the bottom of a barrel because it felt better.” By the time he finished his last word, he was crying. Mjoth tried to cradle him but he pulled away. “No.” Without looking at Mjoth, he patted his own chest, right between his lungs, where it hurt most. “I need to do this myself.”

“None of us can do anything by ourselves,” Mjoth said, wavering. It made Rafn cry a little harder knowing he'd made Mjoth cry too. “All those things you spoke of were done with others. Rafn, you...I noticed you were always alone, away from others. I admired that. How strong you were, not to need anyone else. You were who you were and you didn't need others to do what you did.”

“I did nothing.”

“You were a mercenary. You were a hunter. You were quiet, you were contemplative, you were strong.”

“I'm none of those things.”

“I see those things every day!”

“You didn't see this coming, did you?” Rafn motioned bitterly to the bag on the floor.

Mjoth slid off the bed and knelt at Rafn's feet. He grabbed for his hands and held them tightly to his forehead. “Please. Please don't leave. _Please._ ”

Rafn had spent weeks imagining this conversation, if he ever had it. Half of the fantasies included Mjoth allowing him to go. In most, Mjoth convinced him his drinking was not a problem, and they continued on as they had. Nothing like this ever came to mind. Mjoth had always been a mountain. Immovable, unbreakable, inviolable. He had been settling for Rafn because Rafn was the only man around who wanted to lay with him, and would not have fallen to pieces like this in a hundred years.

Mjoth looked up at him from the floor, eyes already red, glistening bright like glass. “Stay with me,” he whispered.

His chest was knit too tight to draw a full breath. They simply cried together awhile. “Why?” Rafn finally managed to say.

“Do you remember the night I gave you the knife?”

Every day for the past year shone in Rafn's mind. He could recall fletching arrows together on a spring evening; discussing what to breakfast on last year in early summer; handing him logs to store by the stove one morning before the first snow last autumn. Every word exchanged when he received the knife was a glorious hymn he recounted every day since. The only way he could share his sentiment with Mjoth at that moment was nod.

“I wasn't entirely truthful with you. It was a mender who carved it for my friend, but it was my friend who carved that line for me. That line on the handle is my life. I gave it to you because my life was yours too. It still is. It always will be.”

Rafn sank to the floor beside Mjoth and held him for the first time. Whenever there was a time for comfort, it had always been Rafn retreating into Mjoth's arms. So Rafn wrapped his arms tighter around him.

“I'm sorry,” Rafn said. “I'm not going anywhere.” Then he kissed him.

They stayed like that for a long time.


	17. KAUNA

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nid seeks a way to cope.

The campfire was nothing but smoke, tongues of flame trying to lick what little wood remained. She had cooked more food on less heat. As if to spite the fire, Nid cracked one more egg into the pot and watched the whites slowly take form. A bitter taste seeped into the corners of her tongue.

“Asger is slinging stones again.”

Briefly, she closed her eyes, the weight too much to hold for a moment. Only for a moment. She turned on her haunches to Unn.

“I take it he didn’t listen to you this time.”

Unn was her eldest but most affected by the loss of his father. With head bowed and shaking, tears welled in his eyes. “He said he knows you told me to be in charge but he knows I can’t do it. He doesn’t care who sees anymore.”

Nid grabbed his shoulders. “It’s all right. Let the tears fall if they will come.” Unn quickly wiped at his eyes, holding his breath. “Breathe. _Breathe._ There you go. There’s no point in fighting a tide that is determined to come. Once it’s run its course, you can continue being head of house.” Unn took one large shaky breath and let it out slow. “Better?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Good. Let us see Asger together.” She reached for his hand as they walked but thought better of it, instead holding some of her cloak from inside. Unn walked with his chin raised, eyes red and puffy.

She found Tue standing on the edge of the treeline, looking into the copse where his brother was spinning a stone in a stretched old sock like a sling. A bird was perched on a branch high above, seemingly unaware of the danger coming from below. Asger let loose the rock, flying in a wild arc far below the bird, which then flew away.

Nid planted her feet and slowly took in a deep breath. “Asger.”

He heard the threat there. He turned quickly, ready to cower. He looked exactly like she did as a child when she was caught shirking her work. Unexpectedly, her boy steeled himself, and there stood his father, stony-faced and defiant, brown eyes ablaze.

“Come here,” she said.

Asger stepped out of the trees and stood before his family. “Unn was snitching again?” he said to his older brother. His hand coiled tight around his sock sling.

Unn hesitated. “You shouldn’t be doing it, it scares people! You look like—”

“Enough.”

They gave each other heated eyes but heeded her word. Tue had backed away a few steps, slowly fading out of view of his mother.

“You know what I said, Asger. You’re not to sling stones. And you know why you’re not to. What are the consequences?”

He growled. “But you aren’t teaching me to use a bow anyway!”

“Nor will I, should you keep this up. You are proving to me you do not yet know responsibility with a weapon.”

“I can shoot!” he cried in dismay, pointing at the perch his escaped prey had once been.

“It is more than having aim. It’s having the consideration of the people and varl around you. You need to show me you can act like an adult, and that means putting that sling to rest.”

Rather than stamp his feet, yell, cry, or otherwise tantrum, he released his grip on the sling. His shoulders dropped, his face darkened, and suddenly Nid felt as if a door between them had been shut.

“So I need to be head of our house now, instead of Unn.”

Her eldest puffed up but held back, breath held, like fighting off pain from a sudden, sharp wound.

“He doesn’t act like an adult. He’s crying all the faen time.”

“Use that language one more time and I put you to bed with no rations.” Now it was Nid’s eyes that were heated.

“Why? What’s the problem with it? It’s how faen adults talk.”

She backhanded him.

The sting in her hand grew stronger the longer the silence continued. She had never struck her children before. An apology she wished to give never came; she couldn’t find the words. Asger stood still as stone, hand over his face for a moment.

Only for a moment.

He hit her back. It was a sloppy strike, aimed for her face but landed on her throat. Then he ran deeper into the trees, sling held tight in his fist again. She touched the place he struck her. Her other sons had no words in their brother’s absence.

“Isn’t it too dangerous in there, Mom?” Unn asked.

She swallowed hard on the lump in her throat. “Rook has put scouts out there. It’s safe.”

“But shouldn’t we go after him?”

She didn’t respond. Tue gently took her hand in his, unseen. Such a delicate touch. How could he remain so strong?

“Let’s get back. He’ll come when he’s ready.”

Tue’s hand remained in hers, yet still she had not looked at him. They walked back to their tent passed all the other families in silence, so that the chatter and laughter grew all the louder.

Geir had been the one to laugh. There was cheer everywhere when he was near. A temper lived inside him, but it was reserved only to protect his family, be it from theft or harm. If it had been the dredge that had slain him not one month ago, would it have been easier? Would she have been able to lead her children, show them how to live a life of peace, free of grudge and malice?

As they rounded another row of tents, she saw him. Ekkill was surrounded by an entourage of his men from Frostvellr. He made eye contact with her as they passed, and she held his stare, jaw clenched. Tue whimpered, tugging on his hand which she had been squeezing without realizing. The other man let go of her gaze quickly, trading words with the axeman next to him, rubbing his thumb over the handle of his own axe like stroking a pet.

He didn’t know.

When their tent came into view she let go on Tue’s hand and ran, kicking snow once she got to the flaming pot. When her efforts did not bear success, she grabbed the inside of her cloak and shoved the pot off the fire quickly as to not burn herself. It landed in a pile of snow nearby, sizzling out. Burning eggs smelled even more acrid than rotten ones. She stood over the pot, still kicking snow over it to ensure the flames had been doused. Snow had fallen into her shoes. A drop of blood dripped from her forearm. When had she cut it?

“Mom?” Unn said.

“Go inside.”

“Are you crying?” Unn was standing beside her, leaning forward and craning his neck to see her face. “Mom? Are you crying?”

“Go!” Tears splashed from her eyes, heat rose in her face, and her Unn, her poor, sweet Unn, cowered in front of her. His face twisted and he turned quickly to flee her.

She could not hold it any longer; the dam had been broken. She pressed upon her eyes, hoping the pressure would detract from the pain, the fear of that gaping hole inside of her, the one she fell into now. Sobs wracked her, strong enough that she could not catch her breath and make a sound.

_Geir. I can’t._

Tue wrapped his arms around her legs. She had thought he had went into the tent with his brother. Shame lashed out harder than the loss had. Then he let go and ran into the tent.

It was gone. She took in a long, shaky breath to steady herself. The pot had cooled down enough that she could touch it. She brushed the snow and soot off. It was undoubtedly damaged, but by no means ruined.

Nid returned to the fire and went about rebuilding it. It did not take long. Once it was ready, she put her pot over the fire and cracked another egg into it.

* * *

When she woke she had no idea how long she slept. Ever since the sun had halted in the sky, no one could agree when it was time to wake or rest. Whenever the caravan was called to camp she would lay restless in the tent; on the march she was dead on her feet. Time had stopped. Each new day was still the same one from before, the one where she lost her husband and her home.

She gently untangled herself from Unn and Tue. Asger had crawled in with them after a time, curled up in a corner away from them. Time and distance was all he needed. Her lectures would do no one any favours right now.

The world was still quiet, for many had yet to rise. She slipped outside, closing her eyes to take in that deep breath. Cold, crystalline air, sharp and stinging, not quite painful but hard to take in. When she let it go it was with a tremble.

A wet sound made her open her eyes. From in between the two tents across from her she could see into the row over, where a man in a deep red tunic with golden hair stood outside his tent, holding a woman close by her backside. They were so deep into each others’ mouths it was any wonder they hadn’t choked yet. She recognized the girl from Frostvellr. Eydis, the dainty miller’s girl, recently orphaned, if you could consider a child on the cusp of womanhood an orphan. Both of them were tousled, disheveled, and wrapped so tightly around each other that there was no questioning just how much sleeping they had done in the past few hours.

Eventually the man pulled away and put her down, glistening smile full of mischief. Eydis smiled and giggled quietly. If there was grief in her, it was thoroughly buried. He then slapped her rear as she retreated back to her empty tent. His tunic hung loose about him, open at the sides, and Nid caught an eyeful of what he had underneath it.

As soon as Eydis was out of view, the man spotted Nid. He was staring at her brazenly. His long hair and beard shone around him, and even though they stood a good distance apart, she could see the scar that ran up between his sky blue eyes. The man gave her a smirk, slowly turning into his tent.

Nid remained and studied it awhile before seeking out the supplies cart for her sons’ breakfast.

* * *

The caravan had reached a town called Wyrmtoe, an isolated place with a deliberately isolating name. It was filled mainly of recluse varl who were neither welcoming or neglecting towards the herd of refugees that rolled into their streets. The one varl that travelled with Rook, the head of the caravan, knew of someone who lived here that would provide help. There had been talk amongst the people that this could be their new home. Nid did not have to look around long to know they would barely be here long enough to pitch their tents.

However, they were given the order to set camp on the hill, the only space large enough to fit the lost souls who arrived unannounced and unwelcome, and they were guaranteed at least a day of rest. Nid and her sons set up a tent in silence, still tense from the days previous. It was an improvement that Asger was near them, at least, pulling his weight.

“May we go play in the trees, Mom?” Unn asked, once their camp was set. She knew it wasn’t he who was really asking. She looked at Asger, who stubbornly stared ahead, silently fuming.

She then looked at the surrounding trees. “You may. Do not leave sight of the camp. The varl here live alone for a reason; they will not be keen to let little boys run underfoot.”

“We’re not little,” Asger grumbled.

Nid looked at him. “No. Not anymore, you’re not.” She looked away again. “Keep to yourselves. I’ll see you for supper.”

She waited in line for her portion of supper at the cart. On her way back she perused the rows and rows of tents, looking at their details, learning the new map of their homes that day. Nearly all the tents were made from animal skins of the same colour, but she looked for the one a slight shade darker, with red-dyed leather strings on the front.

His tunic had been a vibrant red as well. Red dye was expensive and rare. It drew the eye as much as a feather-down bed, fat grapes, a tower of gold. Golden hair. For a man who was fighting dredge and bandits regularly, he looked like he had all the time in the world to groom himself. Though he was fair-haired and pale skinned, he had a sharp, hard look about him, a look she could not remove from her mind’s eye.

Her sight did not fail her. She spotted it, fifth row from the bottom, fourth tent in. She walked by, careful not to stare, pretending not to be aware but thinking on nothing else.

Her boys returned after a few hours to find their mother roasting a hen over their meagre fire. They ate in silence, and Nid wondered if Unn had sided with his brother, choosing not to rat him out to their mother again. Even Tue was somehow more withdrawn. Despite the gloom, she did not have to tell her boys to wash up after their meal. They worked together like a fine-tuned workshop, seasoned refugees.

They settled into their tent as other families around them had somehow agreed to do the same, pretending the sun still set every day. This time Asger lay close to them, huddled against Tue for warmth. Unn tucked himself by her arm. She lay on her back, staring at the canopy above, waiting.

After an hour or more her sons breathed deep and even. Carefully, she rose from the furs and crept out, ensuring they remained asleep as she left. She descended the hill on the outskirts of the tents, counting the rows.

Fifth row from the bottom, fourth tent in.

She stood outside and listened. All she could hear was deep breathing, though if it was one or two people, she was not certain. She slid a finger in between the tent flaps and peered inside. There was enough light for her to make out his outline. He was alone, to her surprise.

With nimble fingers she undid the red cords and slipped inside. This did not rouse him. She tied the tent flaps closed behind her, only a sliver of light falling into the tent for her to see by, and got down on her hands and knees to crawl over him.

When she put her mouth overtop his furs between his legs, he woke with a sharp intake of breath. She did not stop, but moved more fervently. He grabbed a fistful of her hair and she could not tell if he wanted to pull her away or push her down for more. She looked up to see his sharp eyes. There was enough light that he could see who she was, that she could see the confusion there. The surprise. The lust.

She crawled over his bared chest and pressed her mouth to his, hard. He moaned into her and held her close. Then his hands were everywhere and he had flipped her underneath him. There was that old, familiar rush, down to her belly. She knotted her hands in his perfect golden hair.

Somehow her cloak was unfastened, her tunic loosened, and his teeth and tongue danced on her chest. She grit her teeth and tried not to make a sound. They were surrounded by ears she did not want listening. When he resurfaced his hand was cupped around her, stealing her breath.

“Please,” she whispered.

He moved her skirts out of the way.

He was coiled tight around her as he worked, so different from Geir, who was always slow, soft, never in a rush. Her scarred lover now felt hurried, but kept going far longer than she had thought men could go. Where Geir would caress, this man would yank. She was pulled this way and that for more than an hour, and the better he made her feel, the emptier she became.

When he finally pulled away and spilled himself on his furs, she was left slightly sore, but far less tense. He collapsed next to her and pulled her to him. It stung to like his hands on her, the way he demanded through touch. He was kissing her the same way he had been kissing Eydis just days ago, and where once she thought poorly of it, she was just as deep into it.

They broke apart after a time. He squeezed one of her breasts, and she thought he was going to urge her to tumble again, but quite suddenly his hand dropped and he was breathing deeply.

It was dark there. She pulled away from him, not as concerned about waking him as she had been about waking her boys when she left, and dressed herself again. She did him the courtesy of tying the tent closed behind her when she left. The higher she climbed the hill, the deeper the weight of her actions set in. With each step she remembered a part of Geir, the memories she had just shamed.

When she reached her tent she crept inside and laid down between her sons. Unn and Tue still breathed deeply, but Asger’s breath was steady and thin. He kept his eyes closed. No doubt he wondered where his mother had been.

She stared at the tent canopy above and wondered too.


End file.
